The surgeon received the message on his pager before daybreak: Trooper shot.
A horrible but not unheard-of message for the chief of surgery at Maryland Shock Trauma Center, who insists on being notified whenever a police officer or other first- responder falls in the line of duty.
But then a nurse called to tell Dr. Thomas M. Scalea more: The victim was Tfc. Eric D. Workman, a man he had befriended eight years ago after Workman ended up on his operating table. The trooper had been struck and nearly killed by a car while on duty in 1998.
Scalea raced to the emergency room yesterday. "I walked in, and Eric was still awake," Scalea said, recalling the early morning scene. "He looked at me and said, `You're here, I know it will be OK.'"
Workman was shot when a gunbattle erupted as he and other officers tried to arrest a man suspected of a home invasion in Carroll County.
Workman was wearing a protective vest, but a bullet struck him in the armpit, hit a lung and kidney, then became lodged in his abdomen.
Scalea operated on Workman twice yesterday - shortly after the shooting and again in the afternoon to stop bleeding in his chest. He said the 36-year-old trooper was on life support.
The top surgeon in one of the country's premier trauma centers, Scalea is revered in the tight law enforcement community. He is known for his skill in the operating room and his ability to gently and succinctly deliver updates to family, police officials and the public. In many cases, he forms a personal bond with the officers he treats.
Paul Blair, the head of the Baltimore police union, referred to Scalea as "the walking saint. ... If we get hurt and we are lucky enough to go to Shock Trauma, he will treat us. No matter where he is, he will take care of us."
Edward T. Norris, the former Baltimore police commissioner, called him "a miracle worker." And Leonard D. Hamm, the current city police commissioner, said: "We can't do enough for him."
Up the ladder
Scalea grew up in upstate New York. He graduated from the University of Virginia and then attended the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond. He worked for 15 years at King's County Hospital in Brooklyn before coming to Baltimore.
Now he sits atop a group of 50 physicians at Shock Trauma. This year, the center estimates that 7,200 patients will pass though its doors. Every time one of those people happens to be a police officer, a paramedic or a firefighter, Scalea makes every effort to be the one who treats them.
