We will be reporting on lives saved around the world since our first documented life saved here in Singapore.
AED Successfully Used
Jordan Peters was about 10 minutes into a workout at the Orillia YMCA when a middle-aged man stumbled toward him across the weight room, then slumped to his knees and fell face first onto the floor.
A paramedic with eight years of experience, Peters rolled the man onto his back, just as he started to have a seizure.
“I was holding his head and he started turning a blue colour,” said Peters, 27.
“He didn’t have a pulse.” Assuming the man was having a heart attack, Peters asked one of the Y staff to bring the defibrillator from the main hallway while he and another staff member began mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and chest compressions.
When a staff member handed him the defibrillator, Peters hooked up the two electrode pads to the man’s chest while an off-duty nurse took over the mouth-to-mouth.
An automated voice said “Stand clear, I’m going to give a shock.”
The jolt caused the man to tremble slightly, but he didn’t come around. Peters took over the chest compressions.
“After about a minute his heart started beating again and he opened his eyes and vomited, just as the paramedics showed up.”
The man was dazed and disoriented but able to answer simple questions.
“What happened?” he asked. “I feel like crap.”
“He was clinically dead.” The 44-year-old man who suffered the heart attack was taken to Orillia Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital and then transferred to Newmarket where he underwent heart surgery.
He is recovering in hospital, says Gilda Evely, general manager of the Orillia Y.
This is the first time the defibrillator has been used in the year it has been in the Peter Street facility, said Evely. “We’re very thankful it was here and available in an emergency. These machines save lives.”
Peters says he was simply doing what he is trained to do.
“It was just one of those things — you never know,” he said.
