Submitted by SCAFoundation on Tue, 04/24/2007 - 1:54pm

April 24, 2007 – BISMARK – North Dakota Governor John Hoeven has signed into law Senate Bill No. 2313, which provides for the purchase and distribution of automated external defibrillators (AEDs) in schools. The state superintendent of public instruction will oversee the program, ensuring that school staff are properly trained. The $400,000 needed to support the program will come from the superintendent’s budget.

This is great news for Michelle Tipton of Beulah, who has been working for years to raise awareness about the need for AEDs in schools. Her son, Shannon Huber, then 17, died from sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) in 1999. It was later discovered that the cause of his SCA was long Q-T syndrome, a hereditary condition that affects the heart’s electrical rhythm.

Tipton is creating a database of schools in North Dakota that have AEDs. So far, 40 of 204 school districts have AEDs, she said.