These Are Jeremy Renner's Serious Injuries After His Snowplowing Accident
News of Jeremy Renner’s snowplow accident and associated injuries is constantly being updated. The Marvel actor, recognized for his role as Hawkeye in the Avengers franchise, is going through delicate moments during his hospitalization.
While clearing the roads around his property in Lake Tahoe due to the intense New Year’s snowstorms, he was somehow crushed by the machine he was using. Preliminary reports from the local police do not risk hypotheses, since these vehicles have many safety measures and it cannot be established why it overturned.
However, beyond the doubt about the causes of Jeremy Renner’s accident, what had his fans on tenterhooks was the evolution of his clinical condition. He’s currently in a hospital in Nevada in the intensive care unit, but he was already able to send a message via Instagram.
Thank you all for your kind words. I’m too knackered to write. But I send love to you all. -Jeremy Renner’s Instagram, January 4, 2023
What’s the word on Jeremy Renner’s snowplow accident?
On Sunday, January 1, an emergency call came into the Washoe County Sheriff’s Office requesting assistance for an accident on Rose Highway (Reno, Nevada).
It was about the problem Renner had experienced with the snowplow he owns. On his property, which is prone to heavy snowfall during the winter, his maintenance work was a regular occurrence. In fact, on his social networks, there are several videos and photographs that exemplify the task that the actor carries out assiduously during his stay in Lake Tahoe.
This time, the machine played a trick on him. It’s not clear how it happened, but the vehicle overturned, and then suffered the crushing of one of his lower limbs. In addition, he suffered a closed thoracic trauma.
Jeremy Renner was treated for his injuries, in the first instance, by a neighboring doctor in the area. While official and institutional help was arriving, this professional performed a tourniquet on the injured leg, as the bleeding was profuse.
At 9:50 a.m. local time, a helicopter arrived and loaded the Avengers actor to take him to the hospital. Meanwhile, sheriff’s deputies seized the snowplow as evidence to analyze the cause of the accident.
What is blunt chest trauma and how serious can it be?
One of Jeremy Renner’s injuries, officially reported by his spokesperson’s statement, specifies blunt chest trauma. This means that an external force has struck a patient’s chest, but has not penetrated it, so internal damage is possible, with no injury communicating from the outside to the inside.
It’s estimated that nearly a quarter of motor vehicle accident fatalities have their direct cause in this type of trauma. This statistic is most notable among people under the age of 40.
The good news is that many blunt chest injuries do not require major surgery. They’re usually addressed with minor incisions for a pleurotomy, for example, or with medication.
However, in the context of someone who is polytraumatized – i.e., has injuries to different parts of the body at the same time, the scenario changes. Jeremy Renner’s accident with his snowplow could fall into this more severe category with a less favorable prognosis.
What is injured in these traumas?
In general terms, a blunt chest trauma, like Renner’s, may have affected two types of structures in the chest:
- Bone or hard tissues.
- Soft tissues, such as the lungs, muscles, or pleura.
Within the first group, rib fractures are the most frequent. Up to 40% of thoracic traumas have a rib injury. If the patient is of advanced age, this constitutes a serious risk factor that increases mortality.
The severe problem of a rib fracture is that a part of the rib turns inwards and perforates the lung. This situation is serious, as it must be identified as a priority for action. In addition, in the medium term, it can generate an infectious complication, with pneumonia.
Another derived injury could be the traumatic closed pneumothorax. This is the accumulation of air in the pleura, which is a space that covers the lungs and that, naturally, should not have any content.
Pneumothorax appears, in these cases, due to a rib fracture. Although it is also possible that an injury to the esophagus or the rupture of a bronchus due to impact may lead to the air inside the pleura.
Get to know more: What Is an Intercostal Muscle Strain and How Is It Treated?
Although in thoracic traumas more importance tends to be given to lung and rib injuries, the damage to the heart cannot be underestimated. The clinical picture is called a cardiac contusion.
Detecting it isn’t easy. It requires the expertise of the treating physicians. Delayed recognition increases mortality, which is approximately 76%.
A cardiac contusion can range from mild, asymptomatic, evolving with spontaneous resolution, to rupture of the heart muscle. In between this classification, it’s also possible for the patient to have arrhythmias or a heart attack.
After the tourniquet and surgery on Jeremy Renner’s injured leg, what to expect?
Jeremy Renner’s injuries following his snowplow accident involved a surgical approach. Although not much official information has been released about the procedures, two operations have been performed so far. One would have been on the affected leg.
It’s worth remembering that the first action on this limb was that of the neighboring doctor who performed a tourniquet. The method consists of exerting pressure on the blood vessels that are bleeding in the lower or upper limbs.
According to the journal JAMA of the American Medical Association and the studies of King and collaborators, any available textile material can serve the purpose. Ideally, the fabric used to make the tourniquet should be about 7 centimeters wide.
Once the pressure system is in place, it should not be loosened until qualified assistance arrives. The method is reserved for emergencies, as was Renner’s case. Without the availability of other instruments, the neighbor’s action could have saved his limb.
At the hospital, the actor remains under observation in intensive care. The family’s spokesman had let it be known that the damage assessment was continuing.
We can confirm that Jeremy suffered blunt chest trauma and orthopedic injuries and underwent surgery today. He’s returned from surgery and remains in the intensive care unit in critical but stable condition.
-Jeremy Renner’s spokesman, January 2, 2023
Fans and fellow film and television colleagues are asking for solidarity with the actor, who has already appeared publicly on his social networks. Reports on his condition are updated, although there’s still no definitive prognosis on the sequels.
All cited sources were thoroughly reviewed by our team to ensure their quality, reliability, currency, and validity. The bibliography of this article was considered reliable and of academic or scientific accuracy.
- Cantos Vinces, Juan Carlos y Solís Moreira, Ayrton David (2018). “Estudio de caso: Criterios radiológicos de un neumotórax cerrado causado por un traumatismo directo”. Revista Caribeña de Ciencias Sociales (mayo 2018). En línea: https://www.eumed.net/rev/caribe/2018/05/criterios-radiologicos-neumotorax.html
//hdl.handle.net/20.500.11763/caribe1805criterios-radiologicos-neumotorax - Carriquiry, Guillermo M., and Julio Trostchansky. “Manejo actualizado de las fracturas costales.” Revista argentina de cirugía 112.4 (2020): 380-387.
- Cortés Valerio, Asdrúbal, et al. “Alteraciones electrofisiológicas y/o bioquímicas del trauma cardíaco.” Medicina Legal de Costa Rica 36.1 (2019): 62-67.
- González, Roberto, et al. “Traumatismo torácico contuso.” Revista chilena de enfermedades respiratorias 35.2 (2019): 96-103.
- King, David Richard, Andreas Larentzakis, and Elie P. Ramly. “Tourniquet use at the Boston Marathon bombing: lost in translation.” Journal of trauma and acute care surgery 78.3 (2015): 594-599.