Fellow about to be saved by a drunken medic (8)
I believe the answer is:
academic
'fellow' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'about to be saved by a drunken medic' is the wordplay.
'about' becomes 'ca' (circa).
'to be saved by' indicates putting letters inside (I've seen this in other clues).
'drunken' indicates an anagram.
'medic' with letters rearranged gives '[medic]'.
'a'+'[medic]'='a[medic]'
'ca' going within 'ademic' is 'ACADEMIC'.
(Other definitions for academic that I've seen before include "Intellectual" , "A person studying" , "Theoretical or relating to colleges" , "Theoretical or scholarly - often not practical" , "Scholarly: hypothetical" .)