Pooch was separated from his owner, Eugene Karnaszewski, after a car accident on Highway 1. Karnaszewski was thrown 50 feet from his car and knocked unconscious in the Jan. 31 accident.

He was airlifted to the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center but, when Karnaszewski arrived, he "woke up screaming for his dog," Sunnyvale resident Connie Pugh, a nursing supervisor, says.

"We had to subdue him because he wanted to get out and look for his dog," she says.

Karnaszewski was trying to get out of bed with his neck unstable, says Jennifer Wilkes, the nurse who admitted him. His neck was in a halo traction device.

"We had to find the dog for his sake," Wilkes says.

The three nurses, Betty Berry, Wilkes and Pugh, and social worker Hulden Tang were astonished that Karnaszewski would refuse treatment until his dog was found.

Tang, whose responsibilities include contacting the family members of trauma patients, says when she asked Karnaszewski for his family's telephone numbers he could not remember them. He simply insisted he had to find his dog.

"The patient felt the welfare of the dog was more important than his own," says Tang, a Willow Glen resident.

That's when Pugh and Tang decided to try to help find Pooch.

Pugh contacted the helicopter pilot who had flown Karnaszewski to the hospital and the pilot put her in touch with the first firefighter on the scene. But the firefighter said no dog had been found immediately following the accident. Point Lobos Park rangers then started a search. They were also unable to find Pooch.

So Tang started calling animal shelters and finally found the dog in the Monterey County Animal Shelter in Salinas.

However, proof of ownership was required and the owner "was too unstable to provide it," Pugh says.

The Valley Medical Center employees started calling veterinarians in the places the "sometimes confused" Karnaszewski mentioned he had been.

Finally they found a veterinarian in Flagstaff, Ariz., who had treated Pooch recently and was able to fax the women the paperwork.

Then someone had to go to pick up the dog.

Willow Glen resident Berry, a nurse in the trauma intensive care unit, volunteered and "bailed out" Pooch with a $90 adoption fee.

Pooch and Berry made their way to the hospital so Pooch could be reunited with his owner, but the plan hit a snag. Hospital rules prohibit pets.

"We decided to sneak the dog in," Pugh says.

That meant avoiding the elevators where chances of discovery were high.

Climbing the stairs to the fourth floor turned out to be the least of their problems.

"Pooch was scared of the staircase and we had to carry him up the four flights," Pugh says.

But she said it was worth it just to see the patient "brighten up" and the dog's joy at seeing him.

"He licked him, licked him, licked him, then drank all his water, went round him in circles and then curled up and went to sleep," she says.

But Pooch could not stay at the hospital while his owner recovered.

So Berry took him to her home, where her cat gave him a reluctant welcome. He stayed with her for almost a month until his owner was well enough to take care of him.

The Willow Glen Resident was unable to reach Karnaszewski for comment.

For going the extra mile the four women were honored as heroes by the Humane Society Silicon Valley and Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors on June 8 for their "dogged determination" to find Pooch.

"We are recognizing heroes who saved a life," Humane Society Silicon Valley president Christine Benninger says.

County Supervisor Pete McHugh presented the four individuals with county medals.

"What you did gave Mr. Karnaszewski the will to live," McHugh says. "His family is Pooch."