Pharmacist Acts Fast & Saves Toddler's Life

CHILLICOTHE, Ohio -- An Everyday Hero is working in a Chillicothe pharmacy.

Joshua Smith is a former Air National Guardsmen. He is a Buckeye grad who became a pharmacist and reacted incredibly during a crisis.

NBC 4's Mike Bowersock spoke with Smith and the woman who nominated him. She said Smith saved her child's life.

"I was told I have a condition … I may not be able to even have children," Sarah Blazer said. "We had been trying for awhile, and I thought hope was gone as far as getting pregnant, and we just prayed and prayed about it."

Blazer said her pregnancy was a breeze.

"The pregnancy was the easiest pregnancy of anybody I've ever seen -- no morning sickness, no problems, no complications. Delivery went smooth as it could."

Blazer's 2-year-old son, Evan, was as health as could be -- that is until February 27, 2010.

"He had woke up that Sunday morning … and was just hot as fire. I thought he had been laying by our wood stove to be honest with you. That's how hot he was," she said.

Evan went to the doctor and was prescribed some antibiotics. Blazer went to the pharmacy in Chillicothe where Smith works to fill the prescription.

"His temperature spiked very quickly, and he went into what they call a feverable seizure, and while he was seizing he started to vomit and, trying to vomit, he began to choke," Blazer said.

"I just remember looking down at his face, and his face was almost black at this time. I was really scared, and I thought, 'Lord, please don't let this happen,' " Smith said.

Smith jumped over the counter and grabbed Evan. He said he really didn't know what to do but he knew he had to do something.

"I think I expelled all of the air out of his lungs, and there was nothing left to do but go down his throat," Smith said.

Evan was dying.

"We had a lady there that was praying the whole time. She was just a bystander -- just started praying, and Josh held my son in his hand and said, 'Please, God, help me save this child,' " Blazer said.

Smith said, "Jesus, please help me." Smith said he thinks he may have even screamed it.

"At that point, he just stuck his fingers down his throat," Blazer said.  

"I remember getting to the back of his throat. And it was squish. And it was vomit. He had aspirated. So I went down the first time, and I got it out, and he still wasn't breathing. Then I had to go in the second time, and he did lay into my finger. It took a couple of months to heal, but at the end of the day, he was, he was fine," Smith said.

Blazer said if it weren't for Smith, her son would have died.

"If he wouldn't have known what to do or wasn't there and didn't act upon what he did -- I mean he took his courage and his bravery and so forth and saved my son's life. To me, I'm truly grateful, and I consider him a hero," Blazer said.

"I'm definitely no hero. That's for sure. I just … all I could really think about is my 3-year-old daughter being in my arms, and, you know, I wouldn't have been able to live if it would have went the other way," Smith said.

"I just thank God all the time that he saved my son's life through Josh -- that he had Josh exactly where he needed to be that day," Blazer said. "We tried so hard for a child, and Evan has been such a blessing to us."

For being an Everyday Hero $500 will be donated to the charity of Smith's choice, which is New Beginnings Outreach Ministries in Piketon. New Beginnings specializes helping people with drug addictions, particularly young people.