On a recent Saturday, Steve Glaeser was checking the boxes on typical weekend activities. He had dropped his wife off at a nail salon, picked up mail for his daughter at her house, and then made his way to a West Nashville grocery store.
Glaeser, a financial trainer, says he doesn’t remember anything after being in the grocery store parking lot. “They told me I was in the fruits and vegetables aisle when all of a sudden my lights went out. I have no memory of any of that,” he said.
Relying on witnesses’ accounts to describe what happened, Glaeser said he collapsed, falling straight down on his tailbone. Then, seated on the floor, he fell straight back until his head bounced off the tile floor twice, “like a basketball.”
Fortunately for Glaeser, “Standing next to me was an angel,” he said. “I was told she goes to find a pulse and can’t find one, so she starts doing CPR.”
During this walk he said he was approached by a nurse who said, “Oh, it’s you. You’re the one I worked on in Aldi.” Circumstances, or perhaps fate, brought Glaeser and his angel back together.
Glaeser’s angel is Hannah Watson, BSN, RN, a critical care nurse who joined VUMC and the Vanderbilt Trauma Center from WakeMed in 2024. Watson has received her National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale Certification and is currently working toward a Critical Care Registered Nurse Certification.
Watson said she was in the grocery on the opposite side of the aisle from Glaeser when she noticed him, “looking like he was in a daze.”
“I kept looking at him and all of a sudden he just fell down. His head hit the floor just like a basketball bouncing up and down,” she said. Watson said her nursing instincts immediately kicked in, and she rushed over to Glaeser to render aid.
“The first thing I was thinking was brain bleed because of the way his head hit the floor. I approached him, and I guess my adrenaline kicked in. I remember my own heart was pounding as I was feeling for his pulse,” she said. “He had no pulse, so I started chest compressions.”
Watson said as she was administering chest compressions, she yelled for bystanders to call 911. “I gave him 20 to 30 compressions and was about to give him two breaths when his fingers started to twitch slightly. I stopped CPR and checked his pulse, which was thready but slowly returning,” she said.
As Glaeser regained consciousness he began to tug at his clothes and Watson, fearing he may have suffered a cervical spine injury from the fall, worked to keep him calm and still until paramedics arrived. After the paramedics took over, Watson went on about her day not knowing anything else about Glaeser’s outcome.
Meanwhile, Glaeser was transported to Vanderbilt University Hospital’s emergency department and later admitted to the 10 North Trauma Intensive Care Unit.
“I don’t have much memory of the first four days,” he said. “My granddaughter showed up first, and I didn’t know her name. I didn’t know my name. My wife showed up next, and I didn’t know her name. Then my daughter flew in from out of town, and I didn’t know her name.”
However, on the fourth day Glaeser said he was feeling better, and staff got him up for an escorted walk around the unit. During this walk he said he was approached by a nurse who said, “Oh, it’s you. You’re the one I worked on in Aldi.” Circumstances, or perhaps fate, brought Glaeser and Watson back together.
Watson recalled she was working on the unit’s back hallway and was coming out of a patient’s room when she saw Glaeser in the hallway walking with a therapist.
“When I saw him, my eyes locked on, and I just stopped. I was thinking I was seeing a ghost. I walked up and tapped him on the shoulder and asked, ‘Do you remember me?’” she said. “When I asked, he said ‘no.’”
But when Watson asked Glaeser if he had fallen out in Aldi, all the pieces all came together.
“That’s when I found out my angel works here at Vanderbilt, and on the trauma unit. It was her quick actions, her training and her willingness that saved my life. I’m so grateful,” he said.
Glaeser recently returned to campus to honor Watson at the Vanderbilt University Hospital Nurses Week awards celebration.
“Hannah is kind, funny and compassionate, everything anyone would want in the nurse caring for them,” said Jennifer Graham, DNP, RN, NEA-BC, nurse manager for the Vanderbilt trauma ICU.
