When longtime KVAY radio man Bob DeLancey headed out on a Saturday morning in April to mow his 17 acres on the KLMR Curve, he didn’t expect to wind up in the emergency room.

After all, DeLancey, age 67, is a healthy guy. In fact, other than his annual visits to the Prowers Medical Center Health Fair, he’d rarely set foot in the hospital, even though he’s lived in Lamar since 2003.

But as fate would have it, DeLancey—a popular local personality and former host of the KVAY Morning Show—was repositioning some concrete parts near the fence in order to better mow around them when the middle finger on his left hand got sandwiched against a pylon. Fortunately, he was wearing gloves. Unfortunately, when he took the left glove off, he saw that things were not OK. “Oh boy,” he thought. “I think I just lost the top of my finger.” Blood was geysering everywhere.

DeLancey sheepishly admits that his first thought was to take the mower back to his truck for safekeeping, but as he was pushing it back up the hill, he started to get lightheaded. So he left the mower behind, climbed into his truck and wrapped his finger in Band-aids and paper towels. Then he drove to Prowers Medical Center. As he walked into the ER for the first time ever, a nurse rushed to his side and got him situated in a patient room. A moment later, the ER physician was examining the injury.

“They gave me same pain medication, took X-rays, and the doctor gave me five sutures,” DeLancey said. “I’d broken the bone near the top joint, so the doctor stabilized the finger with a metal splint and wrapped it up.”

Now, two months later, his finger has completely healed. “You can’t even notice it,” he said. “The doctor put the stitches in just right.”

DeLancey reached out to Prowers Medical Center after his experience to say thanks and indicate that he wanted to share his story. “If somebody does a good job, I want people to know it,” he said.

“If Prowers Medical Center hadn’t been there, I don’t know if I could have stopped the bleeding” he said. “It could have been a lot worse. My ER visit was very, very positive.”