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Richmond-Burton High School athletic trainer Julianne Stewart administered a shock to the Poplar Grove man with an automated external defibrillator – one of four the school has on premises. He had suffered a heart attack and collapsed face forward about 7:15 p.m., just before half time, school and emergency officials said.

“Julianne Stewart had the wherewithal to get the AED and … she delivered a shock to revive the gentleman,” Richmond Township Fire Protection District Chief Rick Gallas said. “By the time we got there, he was breathing and starting to talk.”

A Richmond emergency crew took the man, whose name was not released, to Centegra Hospital – McHenry.

Gallas also credited Belvidere Police Department Deputy Chief Dave Ernst, a father who was in the stands for his daughter’s basketball game, for performing CPR on the man before Stewart came over with the defibrillator.

“Dave determined that [the man] was not breathing; he was turning purple, and did CPR on him,” he said.

Richmond-Burton Principal Tom DuBois said the incident was a bit frightening, but that everyone involved responded appropriately and everyone was happy about the positive outcome.

“His son and daughter-in-law just stopped by to thank us,” DuBois said Wednesday morning. “They were on their way to the hospital to go see him. … He appears to be doing OK.”

Gallas said the quick response should greatly benefit the man’s recovery.

“It just goes to show the value of CPR and the use of an AED in the field,” said Gallas, who added that the fire department will present both Ernst and Stewart with a life safety award.

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The 16-year-old student is now recovering in the Intensive Care Unit at Kalispell Regional Medical Center after collapsing during gym class at around 8:30 a.m. Wednesday.

School staff began performing CPR to save his life and then several people, including the athletic trainer and nurse, began using a defibrillator to shock the student and get him breathing.

Three Rivers EMS was on the scene within four minutes and by the time emergency responders got to the student he had a pulse and was breathing on his own.

The student was then taken by ambulance to Kalispell Regional Medical Center and placed in ICU.

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Keegan Shepherd and Sheldon Liikala, two juniors who saw the teen sink to the ground, immediately ran to a nearby school building, said Principal Tim Praino. They knew they would find a breakroom full of teachers.

Mike Edwards the Saviour

Two of the teachers, John Bittinger and Paul Staley, who recently trained to provide first aid and CPR, rushed outside while others called 911 and radioed for one of the new defibrillators.

Praino was sprinting to the gym to get a
defibrillator, until he heard that Edwards already was en route with the machine from his office.

Edwards recently had gone through training on the defibrillator, but didn’t feel too sure of himself when he got the radio call.

Jeremy Brewer the Survivor

“My first thought was, ‘I don’t remember what they told me in the training,’ ” Edwards told the Herald Monday.But when he got to where Bittinger and Staley were performing CPR on Jeremy, he went on auto-pilot — quite literally.

The machine told Edwards it was getting ready to shock Jeremy and to not touch the teen.” The defibrillator checked if Jeremy needed a second jolt and when it decided he didn’t, told the humans to resume CPR, even letting out beeps to show them exactly at what pace to apply pressure to the chest.

Less than two minutes had passed since Jeremy collapsed — and that’s essential to avoid lasting damage.”

In the next couple of minutes, an ambulance showed up.The medics asked if the defibrillator shocked the teen and took over. They took Jeremy to Kadlec Regional Medical Center, where doctors found his heart was beating fine, but that he was not yet breathing on his own. He was flown to Seattle Children’s Hospital and was breathing on his own by Saturday.

On Monday, Jeremy was talking but appeared confused, Praino said. Doctors have said it will take the teen a few days to form clear thoughts, but that he is expected to fully recover.They also said Jeremy was “lucky to have trained individuals working on him within minutes,” Praino said.

Bittinger and Staley forced air into his lungs. Edwards had the machine to jump start Jeremy’s heart. And two students didn’t hesitate a moment to get help.”It was a great example of teamwork,” Praino said.

Just how great became apparent to Edwards only Monday — when he saw the report doctors downloaded from the defibrillator.The graph showing Jeremy’s heart activity was an almost flat, squiggly line when Edwards first attached the pads to the teen’s chest. Ten seconds after the shock was delivered, the usual sharp spikes seen on the heart rate diagram indicated his heart had started beating again.

“I got goosebumps seeing that,” Edwards said. “I thought, ‘Man — this works.’

“When the district’s safety committee discussed buying defibrillators over the summer, nobody objected, but the general consensus was that they likely would never be needed, Gribskov said.

But before the year was out, one of the relatively inexpensive machines has saved a young man from permanent damage or even death.

“We’re certainly thankful we decided to purchase them,” Gribskov said.

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The student collapsed and his heart had stopped beating. Three of the district’s coaches, one of whom is a teacher, used an automated external defibrillator to bring back the student’s heartbeat, according to a statement from the district.

The student was transported to the hospital for testing and observation, according to the statement.

“The quick actions and combined efforts of our district coaches saved the student’s life,” wrote Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction Lauren Hunter in the statement. “For that, we are grateful for their heroism and the emergency training they received through the district.”

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The boy, whose name has not been released, was on the field when he suddenly collapsed, coach Tim Spoonemore said. Unaware of how severe the boy’s injury may be, Spoonemore and coach Brad Averitte rushed on to the field and turned the boy over with Averitte bracing the athlete’s neck.

Adults Honored for Saving Collapsed Azle 7th Grader: MyFoxDFW.com

The coaches quickly realized the boy was unresponsive and had no pulse. While Spoonemore began performing CPR, Averitte continued to brace the boy’s neck while talking to him, comforting him and trying to get him to respond. After a short time, a parent stepped in and took over CPR while Spoonemore left to get one of two automated external defibrillators.

Rita White, a nurse with the district who happened to be watching the game from the stands, said she ran onto the field to help when she saw that the coaches had started CPR. A short time later assistant principal Brian Roberts arrived with the first AED. White, who trains district employees to use the device, then used the device on the player — and he began to breathe.

“I saw his stomach start moving, and that was just the greatest thing,” Spoonemore said during a news conference Wednesday. “When I saw him … getting in the ambulance and he was breathing, that just made my heart jump out of my body almost.”

The player was eventually rushed by helicopter to Cook Children’s Medical Center in Fort Worth, where he remains Wednesday.

The boy’s family has decided not to speak publicly, but did say Wednesday morning that their son is in good condition and that everyone involved in saving their son’s life is a hero.

“It was a team effort. Everyone was here. Everyone had a very important part. No one person is a hero,” said White.

“Going over the scenario again and reliving what everybody in the community from the coaches, to the nurses, to the parents, to the administration, everything that they’ve done has really made today a fantastic day. A young man has life, a father has a son, a mother has a son and it doesn’t get any better than that,” said Averitte.

Azle superintendent Ray Lea arrived at Azle Junior High School minutes after it happened Tuesday and said the entire experience was surreal and that he is the world’s biggest fan of having AEDs on campus.

“Everybody there was in tears and just really shocked. This is just unheard of at a junior high school football game. It was surreal,” Lea said. “I couldn’t be any more proud of my staff to perform the way they did and rescue this young man. I don’t think the young man would be here without the AED.”

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“He also plays basketball and baseball. So he’s very active and he’s kin of accelerated at anything sports related,” said Kyle Cook, Ross’s uncle. Ross’s football coach, Kyle Patterson, added, “He’s a three-way player at this school. He’s a phenomenal athlete.”

On Monday the team had a hard practice. Tuesday’s practice was focused more on teaching the kids. By the end of practice instead of being gathered around one of the coaches, the football players would be gathered around one of their own, praying.

Ross and other teammates were doing some light conditioning. He ran up a small hill onto another field. It was then that he called a teammate’s name and then collapsed to the field.

Ross Palmer the Survivor

“We immediately called 911. I got to him. I checked for a pulse and to see if he was breathing and we had neither,” said Coach Patterson.

A heart that had helped Ross excel in sports had simply stopped. Coaches quickly and calmly started doing what they had been trained to do. They took turns doing chest compressions while checking for breathing and a pulse. Coach Patterson had also sent someone to get the Automated External Defibrillator from the school cafeteria.

“You open it up. You take the pads out. You put them on him and turn it on….You push the red button and he jumps a couple inches off the ground. It was really scary. But immediately we got a pulse and he started breathing on his own,” remember Patterson.

Palmer’s uncle underscored the importance of the AED saying, “If it had been 10 years or so ago when even I was playing sports I wouldn’t have been able to make it because they didn’t have that equipment there.”

Coach Patterson is humble in accepting congratulations for being able to be calm and handle the situation. He says it was a group effort and he’s glad they had the AED on campus. “Grateful for the training, yeah, but it’s the machine that did the work. Whoever invented that machine needs a pat on the back and if I ever meet the guy I’ll shake his hand and tell him, ‘Thank You!’ because of him we have Ross Palmer.”

Ross was taken to the American Falls Hospital. He then was transferred to Portneuf Medical Center. By that time he was conscious and giving a thumbs up to everyone who cared about him. And now, Coach Patterson has a new message for Ross, his team and anyone else listening.

“Yeah, he may never play football again…But there’s a lot more important things, a lot better things to come in his life because of the different group effort of the people in this school and this school district.”

Ross had surgery Friday in Salt Lake City so doctors could put a defibrillator in his chest to start his heart if it ever stops again.

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Seconds after a heat of the decathlons’ 400 meters, Schmidt, the director of Mississippi State University track and field, felt dizzy. A shortness of breath followed.

Al Schmidt the Survivor

Still struggling to breathe, he scanned Spec Towns Track in Athens Ga., for MSU track coaches Steve Dudley and Houston Franks then walked toward them, holding a copper container with glycerine pills. He reached for Dudley where he collapsed, falling into Dudley’s arms, the beginning of his latest fight for his life.

Time, which track coaches constantly monitor, was in short supply.

By the time Dudley took the top off the pill bottle, Schmidt’s jaw had locked. So he rubbed the medicine on his gum line to get it in his bloodstream. It had no effect.

Scar tissue from a triple bypass surgery was causing an arrhythmia — an irregular heart beat — disrupting his heart’s normal functions, blocking blood from traveling throughout his body.

If not corrected, Schmidt’s heart would stop. His skin started to turn blue.

“I checked his pulse,” Dudley remembered. “It was a light pulse but not a good pulse.”

Shocked, athletes surrounded Schmidt. Dudley yelled for an ambulance and medical assistance. Dr. Donald Lazas, the father of a runner from the University of Arkansas, ran from his seat in the stands and performed CPR. Ron Courson, an athletic trainer at the University of Georgia, retrieved the on-site automated external defibrillator (AED).

Schmidt’s pulse returned after the defibrillator’s first administration, then faded. He flat-lined.

It was administered again. This time, his pulse returned and settled, allowing Schmidt’s heart to re-establish an effective rhythm.

Emergency medical support was still en route, but the entrance gate was closed. MSU freshman James Harris ran toward the gate and pushed it open as the ambulance arrived, saving four to five minutes it would have taken EMS personnel to enter the track through a different gate. With cardiac arrest, four to five minutes is long enough to suffer brain damage.

Schmidt, already the survivor of a heart attack in 1998, was now stable and communicating with EMS personnel. He was transported to Athens Regional Medical Center, where he received cardiac catheterization.

Before leaving Athens, Schmidt endured two surgeries — a second bypass surgery and a pacemaker and internal defibrillator installation.

Six weeks later, when MSU introduced new softball coach Vann Stuedeman, most of MSU’s coaches were on hand to welcome her.

Schmidt was there, too, showing no physical effects of open heart surgery. In fact, he told MSU Director of Athletics Scott Stricklin he walked two miles that day.

“To see him not just doing better but feeling good enough to come into work is great,” Stricklin said.

Though he can’t recall the length of time that passed while he was in cardiac arrest, Schmidt understands the mechanics of what happened.

“It couldn’t have happened in a better place,” said Schmidt, who said later learned Athens Regional Medical Center is the top cardiac facility in the area. “If this would have happened at the hotel or someplace else, I would have been a goner.”

Today, the only difference in his life is that he doesn’t run and feels minor chest pain near the surgical incision.

He walks with his wife, Jessie, in Humphrey Coliseum to maintain his cardiovascular regimen.

He doesn’t enjoy walking; he’s a runner, accustomed to logging four to five miles at a time. To Schmidt, walking takes more physical effort than running. After all, he has run 84,000 miles since he started keeping a log during his freshman year of high school, dating back 44 years.

As mundane as walking is, it’ll have to do for now.

“We did two-and-a-half miles yesterday and the pain he’s still experiencing in his chest is probably because it’s still inflamed,” Jessie said. “I think once that subsides to a level where he can accommodate it he’ll get back to running.”

His pacemaker is set for a heart rate of 200, so doctors are comfortable he can return to running full time. The defibrillator in his chest will provide the electrical jolt needed if he goes into cardiac arrest again.

“They say it’ll feel like a mule kicked me in the chest,” Schmidt said.

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“He was unconscious. You could see he was really struggling to breathe and we couldn’t find a pulse,” Ms Neyland said.

David Priest (center) the Survivor

“I yelled out to Eric (Hansson), who is the triathlon coach, to come and help me. I told him to do the respiration while I did the compressions.”

While the pair attempted to resuscitate the 42-year-old father, squad member Matthew Cross sought help from staff at the neighbouring Reservoir Leisure Centre.

Gary McAllister and Nick Zissis shocked him with a defibrillator three times before Ms Neyland continued CPR until MICA paramedics arrived.

“If I had left it longer he would have died,” Ms Neyland said.

“He wasn’t getting any oxygen to his brain and the longer you leave it you either die or have brain damage.

“I was really scared he was going to have brain damage because we had been doing CPR for so long, so I was amazed to hear he woke up and said ‘when can I go back to training’.”

All five received Ambulance Victoria bystander commendations last Monday.

Nominating intensive care paramedic Bradley Roberts said that without the early CPR and defibrillation, Mr Priest probably wouldn’t have survived.

Reservoir Leisure Centre manager Gary McAllister said the defibrillator had been an “invaluable resource”, having been obtained two years ago after much lobbying to Darebin Council.

Mr Priest, from Macleod, said he would be “forever grateful” that he was still here for his wife and children.

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School nurse Samantha Perry said she was leaving the faculty lounge and was alarmed to see students running out of her office and taking a wheelchair with them.

Vanessa Seale the Survivor

“My receptionist said, ‘Sam, it’s Vanessa,’” Perry said. “I took off running to the gym.”

Principal Shannon Houston arrived seconds before Perry and was turning Seale on her side. Perry said she felt for a pulse and found none, then sent Houston for a defibrillator as she started CPR.

Houston said the defibrillator — one of three in the school — was in a wall-mounted case in a hall, about 50 feet from where Seale had collapsed.

“It was right outside the gym,” she said. “I’ve never run so hard.”

Perry and coach Todd Tolbert performed CPR until the defibrillator was attached to Seale and told her rescuers that she needed to be shocked.

Seale said the machine is “pretty dummy-proof” and does practically everything for its user.

“It starts speaking to you the moment you open it,” she said. “If there’s not a heartbeat, it says shock is advised.”

Seale said all a user has to do is push a big red button, then stand clear.

Seale needed two shocks before her heart started again.

Data collected by the defibrillator was given to a cardiologist, who determined that she has a previously undiagnosed condition called long QT syndrome, Seale said.

She collapsed once in 2004, but her heart didn’t stop.

“It’s genetic, so I’ve had it forever,” Seale said.

She now has an internal defibrillator resting just under the skin and connected to her heart.

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That angel materialized in the form of the Breaux Bridge coaching staff, which launched into lifesaver mode when the freshman football player was found face-down on the sideline.

Lewis had just come off the field during the Tigers’ spring football scrimmage, grabbed a gulp of water, and took a knee to watch his teammates.

Moments later, Lewis was sprawled out on the ground, his face buried in the grass.

Instinct and training immediately took over for Breaux Bridge head coach Paul Broussard and his staff.

“When we turned him over, we knew that something was wrong,” Broussard said. “We have an emergency plan in place and we’ve been practicing it with our school nurses.

“Each coach is responsible for a certain thing. We had just practiced it with our school nurses right around the Easter holidays. Everybody put the plan in place and thank goodness we had that machine.”

Broussard and assistant coach Kevin Bonhomme began CPR, while coach John Muder raced to the gym to get the AED (automated external defibrillator) machine.

Assistant coaches Brent Angelle and Rickey Poulan ushered the remaining players into the gym.

When Muder arrived with the AED machine, he took over the mouth-to-mouth resuscitation as Broussard and Bonhomme began to use the defibrillator.

“People have asked me what was going through my mind, and honestly, you don’t think, you just react,” Bonhomme said. “There was no thinking. That’s where the routine and the training just kicks in.”

The coaches were able to revive Lewis, and he was conscious when Acadian Ambulance arrived on the scene moments later.

“We had lost him a couple of times, but by the time (Acadian Ambulance and Air Med) got there, he was conscious again,” Broussard said.

Lewis was air-lifted to the hospital, while the coaches followed in their vehicles. Bonhomme said it wasn’t until that moment that he was able to catch his breath and realize the magnitude of the situation.

“Adrenaline kind of takes over,” Bonhomme said. “Later on, when I was going to the hospital, I started thinking about it again and I got scared. At the time, you just react.

“On the ride to the hospital, I called my parents and my sister just to hear their voice and make sure they were OK.”

Lewis is doing well and could be released from the hospital as early as Tuesday. Thankfully, he doesn’t remember anything.

“I spoke to him Saturday and again (Monday),” Broussard said. “They will put a heart monitor on him. I think they found out what the problem was; it’s some kind of heart condition that went undetected.

“He doesn’t remember anything. At the hospital that night, I was asking him about it, and he still doesn’t remember what happened. He said pretty much the last thing he remembered was coming off the field.”

Broussard said the fact that Breaux Bridge had a plan in place, as well as rehearsed that plan a few times, definitely helped save Lewis’ life.

“I’m glad we had the emergency plan in place and I’m glad our nurses and principals kept on us to practice the plan,” Broussard said. “It was amazing. We didn’t panic. We just went into the plan and did what we were trained to do. A lot of the things, I don’t even remember what happened.

“I’m glad we were trained and I’m glad we were prepared. I’m glad the end result came out like it did. Our school nurses and principals did a good job of preparing us for this type of situation.”

Part of the training was to simulate an incident during practice. It’s one of those things that coaches might do reluctantly, but Broussard says it was definitely worth the time to practice the plan.

“There’s really never a good time to practice it, but I’m glad we did it,” Broussard said.

“We took the whole football team out there one day and did a mock run and put us on a clock and timed us. That was right around the Easter holidays, so it was still fresh in our mind.

“On the way to the hospital, one of the coaches said ‘Thank goodness we just had that mock drill.’ We were prepared and knew exactly what we had to do. Our nurses and principals were persistent in getting us to know what to do and thank goodness for that.”