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(CN) - The California Supreme Court should provide guidance on demands that all retailers there need defibrillators for customer emergencies, the 9th Circuit said Tuesday.
Mary Ann Verdugo experienced sudden cardiac arrest in 2008 while shopping at a Target in Pico Rivera, Calif. It took paramedics several minutes to arrive, and the 49-year-old died at the scene.
The tragedy is not uncommon, according to the 9th Circuit, which noted that 300,000 people go into sudden cardiac arrest every year in America. Only 8 percent survive, and those who do generally have their heart restarted by an Automatic External Defibrillator (AED) within five minutes. While Target sells AEDs on its website, it does not require their installation in its stores.
Verdugo's mother and brother sued the retailer for wrongful death, but Target disputes that it has a duty to install AEDs in its stores.

Smartphones, already used to alert us of such pressing matters as sports scores and new Facebook posts, could soon help save lives in L.A.

The Los Angeles Fire Department will soon begin using an application called PulsePoint, which sends messages to people's cellphones when someone is having a cardiac emergency nearby.

The hope is that people trained in CPR will install the app, see the alerts and be able to start life-saving treatment before paramedics arrive.

Sometimes, after they see an ambulance pull up, bystanders wish they had known someone needed help, said Capt. Tom Gikas, who works in the Fire Department's Planning Section.

"How many people on a given evening in a local restaurant know CPR?" Gikas wondered.

That's exactly the question that led to PulsePoint.

Richard Price, now president of the PulsePoint Foundation, said it started about three years ago, when he was the fire chief in the San Ramon Valley, east of Oakland.

Kim Mendes, Charlotte, NC – 46 at time of event (2013)

Kim is an early riser. The alarm wakes her at 4:30am but she does like a little snooze before getting out of bed. This one time the snooze went longer than normal. Arnesto her husband heard a strange sound, he called out "Binky?", but when he looked over he saw Kim had her tongue between her teeth and wasn't breathing.

Julie Stone, Des Moines, IA – 54 at time of event (2012)

Life can be stressful, and we all have ways to relieve it. For Julie the choice was not obviously dangerous, how could it be? iPod and sneakers, pounding the pavement in the local neighborhood and she went down. Face down that is, just a block from her home. The neighbors were shocked to see it happen and especially when they realized Julie had no pulse, and no breaths. But, they immediately called 9-1-1.

The Sudden Cardiac Arrest Foundation, a national nonprofit organization, will participate in the Highmark Walk for a Healthy Community on Saturday, May 18 in Pittsburgh, PA, to raise awareness about the nation’s leading cause of death and help save lives. Survivors and families affected by sudden cardiac death are urged to join or support the team here.

The automated external defibrillator industry is about to get a bit of a jolt, according to Brendon Nafiger in DOTmed Business News. In March, the Food and Drug Administration released a long-in-the-works proposed order that will toughen the procedure for getting the devices on the market after a number of high-profile recalls. It's unclear exactly how this will affect AED-makers, but it could dramatically increase the money and time needed to commercialize the life-saving equipment.

Not everyone is happy about this. The fear is that the new regulations could, by making it harder and more expensive to commercialize devices, discourage innovation or raise the costs of AEDs. Pricier automated defibrillators, which already run between $1,000 and $2,500 per unit, could make it less likely that budget-strapped public facilities will have them on hand in an emergency. 

Athlete's sudden death a tragic reminder that sudden cardiac arrest can happen to anyone, anywhere, anytime

PITTSBURGH, PA--Just before heading to the starting line for the Pittsburgh Half Marathon on Sunday morning, Kyle Chase Johnson toasted his roommate, Alex Calder, with a glass of raw eggs.

“I woke up with him this morning at 6, and he was doing the ‘Rocky' thing,” said Calder, Johnson's former classmate and teammate from the North Allegheny High School football team. “He drank the whole glass of eggs, but he said it was a lot more difficult than he'd thought it was.”

TORONTO--Prompt use of an automated external defibrillator, or AED, can greatly increase the survival rates of people who suffer a cardiac arrest.

Yet a new study has found that publicly registered AEDs in Toronto are not in the best positions to help victims of cardiac arrest. In fact, less than one in four of all cardiac arrests had an AED close by (within 100 metres is the required distance). The average distance to the nearest AED was closer to 300 metres.

Current guidelines suggest areas associated with the highest risk of cardiac arrest should be targeted for AED deployment, after they have been placed in obvious high-traffic areas such as transportation hubs or major sports venues. But it’s not clear how to identify these “cardiac hot spots.”

Articles such as "The Loophole That Keeps Precarious Medical Devices in Use" and “AEDs in the Workplace, Benefit or Burden,”  which raise concerns about the safety of automated external defibrillators (AEDs) without recognizing their overarching life-saving value, create confusion and are not in the public’s best interest.