First Aid Corps

A custodian, who happened to be in the room when 16-year-old Brandon Hernandez touched his head, complained of being dizzy and fell back in his chair during his after-school class at Tottenville High School, sent a message about an unconscious student over the radio, and an assistant principal put out a call to the dozens of staff members on campus trained in CPR.

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Melendez, who was only several doors away at the time, was the first to make it to the room.

“I could see he was in distress. He was breathing but his breathing was irratic. His color was off,” he said.

As others dialed 9-1-1, Melendez leaned over Brandon.

“Because I am a track coach I knew something was wrong. I started to check his pulse,” he said. “I said, ‘I think we should get the box.’ I called ‘Code Blue.’ At that moment, the training really kicked in.”

Within seconds, school staff were racing into the room with defibrillators. Following directions dictated by the machine, Melendez shocked Brandon twice.

“He let out a breath of air I will never forget in my life,” said Melendez. “It was incredible.”

Brandon’s mother – who had been waiting in the parking lot to pick him up – was hustled inside by another student. She first saw her son, on a stretcher, being wheeled down the hall by fire fighters and emergency medical responders. “I felt like it was a dream,” said Rebecca Hernandez, whose son, prior to that day, had never shown any sign of a heart problem. She rode with him in the ambulance to Staten Island University Hospital, Ocean Breeze, where he was in an induced coma for 48 tense hours. After that, he woke up.

Doctors told her that her son had not lost any brain function, thanks entirely to the quick response at Tottenville. “I see it as my son’s second birthday,” she said. “Every day I count my blessings, because everybody here worked together; everything worked right. The AED machine saved his life. Mr. Melendez saved his life. He’s our hero.”

After dozens of tests, aided by the microchip in the AED which recorded the activity of his heart that day, doctors still could not determine what caused Brandon’s attack. He underwent surgery to have an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator put into place, in the event his heart ever gives way again.

He was able to return to school May 1.

“I don’t remember anything about that day. I woke up in the hospital; I figured something bad had happened,” said Brandon, an inclusion student at Tottenville with P25R. “I was happy to be alive.”

A deputy’s quick thinking during a traffic crash saved a man’s life, a Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office spokesman said.

Police received a call at 11:32 a.m. on April 26th that a car had crashed on SW Boeckman Rd. and SW Laurel Glen St. The caller reported that the driver was unresponsive and may have had a heart attack.

While police rushed to get to the scene, Clackamas County Sheriff’s Deputy Josh Eagle grabbed an automated external defibrillator from the Wilsonville Police Department office. Once at the site of the crash, police determined that Richard Adolphson, 80, of West Linn did not have a pulse.

During resuscitation efforts, Eagle used the defibrillator and successfully revived him. A second deputy, John Wildhaber, also did chest compressions on Adolphson.

“This is a great example of the importance of having first responders who are willing to use CPR and an AED,” said Tualatin Valley Fire and Rescue spokesman Brian Barker. “Every minute that you delay CPR and defibrillation, the patient’s chance for survival decreases 10 percent.”

Wilsonville Police officers also helped treat Alophson.

After the crash, he was taken to Meridian Park Hospital.

First-grader Bowen Johnson is back at school with an implanted heart defibrillator two weeks after a teacher saved his life.

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The 7-year-old’s heart stopped during physical education on April 11 at Western Heights Elementary in Lake Charles.

“He was running around outside, playing with his friends for just about two minutes before he headed to the slide,” said Ken Flue, the school’s adapted physical education teacher for Western Heights. “He stepped on to the first step on the plastic playground and immediately collapsed.”

Flue moved the boy into the shade. Bowen had a faint pulse and was barely breathing. Then he stopped. Flue began rescue breathing and CPR while special-education aide April Jones ran to tell the front office to call 911.

Secretary Rhonda Cortez called on her cellphone while running to the playground, so she could relay instructions. Flue kept Bowen breathing for 10 minutes, until an ambulance arrived.

The school had also called Bowen’s parents, Steve and Eva Johnson, who arrived shortly before the ambulance.

“I was in shock. To see our son lying on the ground unconscious, he wasn’t breathing,” said Eva Johnson. “It was hard. It’s not something you see with children.”

Emergency medical technicians used a defibrillator to restart Bowen’s heart. Without Flue, he might have died before they arrived, they said.

“Everything worked just right. Everything was real surreal. When they put the paddles on him, I couldn’t watch that part,” Flue said. “He’s a very special kid, and it was definitely a God thing.”

Bowen was taken to Christus St. Patrick Hospital, then flown to Children’s Hospital in New Orleans, where doctors implanted a defibrillator in his chest. It was the 21st operation for Bowen, who was diagnosed two years ago with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy — a condition that causes the heart muscle to become abnormally thick, making it difficult for the organ to pump blood — and was badly burned in a house fire in October 2008.

After the fire, doctors gave him a 2 percent chance of survival. It was three months before he had recovered enough at a local hospital to be moved to a burn center in Cincinnati.

“He had to spend 3 1/2 months completely immobile. Then he went through all of the grafts and had to relearn how to walk, how to feed himself, to do anything on his own,” Johnson said. “He never stopped. Even when I knew it hurt him, he didn’t stop.”

Johnson attributes Bowen’s amazing recovery to his resilient spirit and fun personality. Bowen was able to return home in 2008, but must return to the burn center about twice a year for checkups and new skin grafts.

He has so much scar tissue in his left shoulder that doctors had to put the defibrillator farther away from his heart, in his right shoulder.

“He was in surgery for 5 1/2 hours while they tried to find a place and then tested to make sure it worked,” Johnson said.

For the first responders at Western Heights, having Bowen back at school is “nothing short of a miracle.”

“I’m so glad to see him. I’m glad he’s back,” Jones said. “He’s running around like nothing ever happened.”

“Bowen is probably one of the coolest kids I’ve ever met,” Flue said. “No matter what happens he just bounces right back. He’s just amazing.”

Bowen’s entire class welcomed him back, but it was his two best friends and “special helper” classmates who missed him and worried about him the most.

“I really missed him. I was worried because he was in surgery,” said Isabella Young, who helps Bowen write and hold his school supplies. “When he came back he said he had stitches in his arm so I’m even more worried about that.”

“It’s good he is back,” said Brylie Fontenot. “Today I helped him get his tray at lunch.”

Energetic as always, Bowen spent his first day back at school running around with his friends, playing his favorite “SuccessMaker” computer game, and watching an episode of “The Magic School Bus.”

“I’m happy I’m back, but now I have homework,” Bowen sighed.

Lynda Donaldson suffered a cardiac arrest outside her Saintfield restaurant last year.

Lynda Donaldson the Survivor

A first aid trainer spotted her and used a defibrillator which he had in his car boot to revive her.

Now the PSNI has said they will pay for a defibrillator for the town.

Lynda was with her husband when she collapsed.

“I had had no pain, nothing,” she said.

“We had been out for our lunch and were having a good day and just as we got to the door, I felt, all of a sudden, dizzy and went to put my hand out to Grahame to say ‘I feel dizzy’ and I didn’t even get the words out,” she said.

Nurse Michelle McAvoy, who was passing, gave Lynda cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

First aid trainer Philip Batt also happened to be passing and noticed a commotion on the street.

“I thought I was seeing things to be honest,” he said.

“I pulled over and grabbed my equipment out of the back out of the back of the car, the first aid kit, the defibrillator and the oxygen that I was carrying.”

Ms Donaldson has now started a campaign to buy defibrillators.

“You need to get them into schools and get young ones trained and coming through because in a number of years time we’ll have lots of people who are able to do this,” she said.

“If you don’t get the proper assistance within eight to ten minutes you just don’t survive and that is just how critical it is with cardiac arrest,” she said.

“How can I ever thank those people for saving my life? They are just amazing.”

A group effort between first responders and staff at Bixby High School has given a student a second chance at life.

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Jonathan Fussell, 15, was born with a heart defect. At the age of two, he underwent a heart transplant.

In the middle of a Monday class, that heart failed him — sending him into cardiac arrest.

Teacher Josh Smith helped give CPR to Fussell as assistant principal Roland Vernon grabbed a heart defibrillator, or AED.

“He was completely unresponsive and didn’t have a heart beat for a really long time,” Smith said. “Even after our machine shocked him for the first time, he didn’t have a pulse. It was really worrisome.”

But the Bixby faculty didn’t give up, relying on hours of training and the AED to keep him alive until medics arrived.

“Early defibrillation is what got Jonathan the fighting chance that he needed,” said EMSA spokesman Chris Stevens.

On Thursday Fussell was stable enough to fly to Little Rock Children’s Hospital, where he will go back on the transplant list.

Barbara Smart says the quick action of those involved is the reason her grandson is still alive. She believes every school should have defibrillators on sight.

“It is amazing. Every school in the nation needs to have these tools to work with,” she said. “Because you never know when this could happen to a child.”