Blogs

Automated external defibrillator helps revive woman at Duluth airport
Bystanders used an automated external defibrillator and CPR to revive a woman who collapsed at Duluth International Airport on Sunday afternoon.

By: Steve Kuchera, Duluth News Tribune

The woman was waiting to go through security when she collapsed. Bystanders, including a nurse, couldn’t find a pulse or sign of breathing. A Transportation Security Administration supervisor ran to get one of the terminal’s automated external defibrillators.

AEDs are portable devices that, when attached to a patient, automatically
detect whether the person’s heart is beating irregularly. If so, the device instructs the user to administer an electric shock, which can spur an irregularly beating heart back into a normal, effective beat.

The nurse administered at least one shock and performed CPR until the woman became responsive.

Teamwork helped fallen 8th-grade Jessie Clark player after he collapsed
By Jim Warren — jwarren [at] herald-leader [dot] com

Posted: 12:12pm on Feb 7, 2012; Modified: 2:20pm on Feb 7, 2012

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/2012/02/07/2059144/teamwork-helped-fallen-8th-gr...

Fayette County school district officials said Tuesday fast action by an athletic trainer, safety procedures that worked according to plan and some good fortune came into play after eighth-grader collapsed at a baseball conditioning drill Monday afternoon.
The Jessie Clark Middle School student, identified as Benjamin Highland, was reported in critical condition Tuesday morning at University of Kentucky Chandler Hospital. The incident occurred about 5:30 p.m. on the baseball field at Lafayette High School.

What follows is a recounting of something that happens every day. But it almost always only happens when someone steps up and performs Bystander CPR.

Why is it that Bystander CPR is performed only one third of the time?

Seriously, I'd like to have your opinion. We're trying to fix the problem, and while almost everybody says "Hey. That's a good idea. I need to get trained." it's rare to find a population that is more than 35% trained, and only a third of the cardiac arrest victims receive bystander CPR.

Here's the story of another save.

Bob

_________

Lafayette General honored a Lafayette woman with the Making a Difference award for going above and beyond, giving life saving CPR to a jogger who had collapsed.

Monday, January 9th started as any other day for Gary Dodson. He went to work and then around 11:30 went home for lunch and was planning on continuing his normal routine.

BY MARSHA SILLS
Acadiana bureau
February 04, 2012

“I’m a living example: This is what knowing CPR can do.” Gary Dodson, who received CPR after a heart attack while jogging

LAFAYETTE — For years, Gary Dodson put off attending free bystander CPR training held annually at the Cajundome.

But that changed this year, he told a crowd gathered in the lobby of Lafayette General Medical Center.

“You can make a difference. … Everyone needs to know it,” he said.

And no one knows that better than Dodson, who suffered a sudden cardiac arrest Jan. 9 while jogging in Girard Park.

“My heart stopped,” Dodson said.

By: Sarah Gorvin, The Republican Eagle
Goodhue County.

When Red Wing School District began installing automated external defibrillators in its buildings a few years ago, high school Principal Beth Borgen said she hoped they would never need to be opened.

“I said, ‘This is the best use of taxpayers’ dollars that I hope we never have to use,’” she said.

But on Jan. 20, a student, whose name or age can’t be released due to privacy laws, sat down while running laps in the gym.

“They thought he was taking a breather,” school nurse Kris Klassen said.

Then the student collapsed unconscious into a staff member’s arms, and people knew something was seriously wrong. Klassen, who also works as an emergency room nurse, was called to the gym over walkie-talkie.

“I’ve been through this before, but not in a school setting,” she said.

The NIH has launched two multicenter clinical trials that will evaluate treatments for sudden cardiac arrest that occurs out of the hospital.

The CCC trial will compare survival with hospital discharge rates for two CPR approaches — continuous chest compressions combined with pause-free rescue breathing vs. standard CPR — delivered by paramedics and firefighters to those experiencing cardiac arrest. Trained emergency personnel will give all participants in the CCC trial three cycles of CPR followed by heart rhythm analysis and, if needed, defibrillation.

There have been two trials in Scandanavia that showed 30%-40% improvements in outcome with compression-only CPR. There was a study in Japan that showed that, for a specific class of heart disease, compression-only CPR was not as good as 30 & 2 CPR.

Tragically, a 64 y/o gentleman died in San Antonio yesterday. The cause of death has not been announced, but it's likely that it was either a sudden cardiac arrest, a ruptured aortic anurism, or asphyxia via drowning, with the most likely being a sudden cardiac arrest.


It is apparent from the article that there are a number of problems with the way public pools are staffed and managed that make it unlikely that someone could survive in the situation this gentleman encountered. Even more sadly, most of these factors are to some degree controllable by the management of the pool.

THE SHORT FORM:

My mission is not to criticize anyone. My Mission is to point out that the odds of surviving were not good for several structural reasons and to rally public support for changing the environment.

THE DETAILS:

KSAT.com published the news, and their story included the following.

As reported in The Republic (Columbus, Indiana) from an API story.

Staffers revive Columbia Falls High School student who collapsed in gym class

KALISPELL, Mont. — Columbia Falls High School staffers used CPR and an automated external defibrillator to restore the heartbeat of a 16-year-old student who collapsed during gym class.

The Daily Inter Lake reports (http://bit.ly/wNCj7v) health and physical education teacher Troy Bowman and school nurse Cathy Dragonfly aided the boy Wednesday morning. He was then taken to Kalispell Regional Medical Center, where he was listed in stable condition in the intensive care unit later Wednesday.

Superintendent Michael Nicosia says it is unclear what caused the student to collapse.

[Blogger's note: If the AED restored his heartbeat, the cause of his collapse was most likely Sudden Cardiac Arrest.]

The following report is from Central New York

Real Hero:Adult Good Samaritan-Knowing CPR saves father's life
by Laura Hand Posted: 12.29.2011 at 6:00 PM

When Robert Crouse had a massive heart attack while watching TV last April, Stephanie Jackson and her mother were nearby. Both had been trained in CPR, but the mother was too distraught to act, so Stephanie, who had learned CPR ten years earlier in high school, began doing chest compressions and rescue breaths.

All she could think of was 'no one else was going to step up,' says Stephanie. "I always doubted myself, but the brain pulls it out."

It took paramedics ten minutes to get there, and get him to a hospital, where doctors did not expect Robert to survive. He had two more heart attacks, and now has a pacemaker implanted, and he credits his daughter for saving his life.

An article published by Circulation and written by Yonemoto et al. has quantified the effect of Bystander CPR. It's conclusive.

See www.slicc.org/Yonemoto_A18041_Circulation.pdf

The investigators examined all cases in the All-Japan Utstein Registry of sudden cardiac arrests occurring in 2006 through 2009, where the arrests were witnessed by a lay-person 18 years old or older. Nearly 20,000 cases were available. The definition of 'survival' used was 'discharged with CPC-1 or CPC-2 neurological status'. (i.e., totally neurologically intact, or able to perform the activities of daily living without assistance.)

The graph in the abstract was cropped in transmission. The full graph is at www.slicc.org/Circ_CPRAEDvsCPR_Japan.jpg

The short form is that - based upon a 20,000 victim cohort - it is really clear that CPR + AED use results in a lot more CPC-1 and CPC-2 survivals than CPR alone.

for those who were defibrillated in the [left column] number of minutes;