Pat Doherty and Trevor Tinney were attending an Ontario Hockey Association board meeting in Cambridge Nov. 18 – Doherty as a life member and Tinney as chair of the Central Junior C Hockey League – when Doherty, 81, suffered a heart attack.
Another OHA director, Rick Richardson, a fire chief, immediately began to administer CPR, 30 chest compressions at a time. Tinney assisted by breathing twice into Doherty’s lungs at Richardson’s signal.
“It seemed like forever,” Tinney said Monday, but he estimates the pair kept up their efforts for no more than seven minutes before emergency personnel arrived with a defibrillator and managed to get a pulse.
Doherty was rushed to Cambridge Memorial Hospital where he was given the last rites before being transferred to St. Mary’s Hospital in Kitchener.
“They figured we probably saved him,” Tinney said. “If we hadn’t done anything he probably wouldn’t have made it.”
“I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for them,” Doherty said. “I don’t want to get kind of weepy about it. But that’s the truth.”
“Just to see his family and how appreciative they were [made for] a very emotional meeting,” Tinney said.
