Jim Baum is a good neighbor. After seeing AEDs mounted in the Chicago O’Hare Airport, he spoke to a physician friend about them. Jim decided that he should have a device in each of his three homes because the neighbors in each location were elderly.

The defibrillators Jim ordered arrived in October 2003 and sat in the corner in their boxes for a month or so. While packing to go to their condominium in Puerta Vallarta for Thanksgiving, Jim’s wife Nancy threw one of the boxes in their suitcase and didn’t give it much more thought.