A doctor at Tufts Medical Center died after she was hit by falling ice while on a hike with her family, hospital officials and relatives said.
Dr. Judith Pinsker — a 57-year-old primary care physician of more than two decades at Tufts Medical Center in Boston — died Sunday as efforts to revive her were unsuccessful after she was struck in the head as she hiked in New Hampshire’s White Mountains, the Boston Globe reports.
Pinsker was walking along the Frankenstein Cliff Trail in Hart’s Location with her husband, two sons and some friends when the accident occurred. She was then rushed to Memorial Hospital in North Conway, where she died from her injuries, officials from New Hampshire’s Fish and Game Department said.
Witnesses told CBS Boston that Pinsker was knocked unconscious by the hunk of falling ice and carried off the mountain on a stretcher.
“I left where she was to get down to south coverage to call 911, an ambulance and a helicopter,” a member of the rescue team, Joe Klementovich, told the station, adding that Pinsker suffered severe head injuries and blood loss.
Klementovich said rain and warm temperatures in the days prior to Sunday contributed to the fatal incident.
“Not a freak accident,” Klementovich told the station. “An unfortunate one for sure.”
Pinsker’s husband, Benjamin Smith, told the Boston Globe that his wife was a “force of nature” who had many varied interests: from a deep passion for the outdoors to baking to serving on the advisory board at a nonprofit group that sends medical service teams around the world called Timmy Global Health.
“She was always trying to find the meaning of life,” Smith said, adding that Pinsker “kept a lot of balls in the air” and maintained a varied web of friends and contacts.
Pinsker, of Wellesley, Massachusetts, is survived by Smith and the couple’s two sons, Eric Pinsker-Smith, 22, and Jeffrey Pinsker-Smith, 20, who remembered her as a diligent worker who also enjoyed her downtime on weekends with friends and relatives.
“She was always mindful and just really valued the time she was able to spend with her family,” Jeffrey Pinsker-Smith told the Globe.
Tufts Medical Center officials said in a statement that Pinsker was a “thoughtful, compassionate [and] meticulous” primary care doctor of 20-plus years who treated hundreds of patients with kindness and expertise.
“[She] was always there for her patients and her colleagues,” Deborah Blazey-Martin, Tufts’ chief of internal medicine and adult primary care, told the newspaper.