Texas school shooting: Trauma surgeon chokes up while talking about how her team is treating injured victims

• A Texas trauma surgeon described how her team treated victims of the school shooting in Uvalde.
• She said she was "grateful" for the chance to tell parents that their children were alive.

A trauma surgeon in Texas became emotional while talking about how she and other medical staff were treating victims of Tuesday's mass shooting at the Robb Elementary School in Uvalde.

In an on-air interview with CBS News, Lilian Liao, the director of pediatric trauma at the University Hospital in San Antoni, gave an update on the victims received at the hospital.

"I think our current focus is taking care of the patients that we did receive," she told the outlet while choking up. "And taking care of them in a way that we can help them, first of all, get out of the hospital, but also to be able to live their life to the fullest."

Liao and her team tended to several patients who were transported to the hospital, located around 80 miles away from Uvalde. Most of the shooting victims were sent to the Uvalde Memorial Hospital.

Liao told CBS that it was a "challenge" speaking to the victims' families, who were "in shock."

"But sometimes I think in these situations we need to stay positive," she said as she teared up. "And the fact that we have the opportunity to talk to these families, we're grateful for that. That we had the opportunity to say your child made it to the hospital alive."

Liao told CBS that her team had been prepared to receive more patients and were able to kick into high gear and start work quickly when patients arrived.

Per the outlet, she said many victims had "high-velocity firearm injuries," which caused severe damage. Liao also explained that this was probably why most of the victims "didn't make it to the hospital alive."

"When you talk about a child, their body surface area is much smaller than an adult, so when a projectile hits them at a high velocity, it will create a bigger destruction," she told CBS.

"You can bleed to death in five minutes," she added.

Tuesday's mass shooting has left at least 21 people, including 19 children, dead. The 18-year-old gunman was killed at the scene by law enforcement officials.