First Aid Corps

Christopher P. Prezioso, an avid golfer who works as supervising judicial marshal in Waterbury Superior Court, saved Hunt’s life the day after winning the men’s championship tournament Saturday afternoon at Watertown Golf Club’s pro shop.

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“Not only was he the winner, but the hero for the weekend,” said Ian Marshall, head golf professional at the course.

Prezioso said he walked into the shop at about 7 a.m. and greeted Hunt, who was talking to an employee at the counter. While Prezioso was turned away, he heard a noise like something sliding down a wall and turned back to see Hunt face down on the floor.

Yelling for the pro shop staff to call 911, Prezioso rolled Hunt over, noticing his struggle to breathe and his faint pulse.

“Then he just kind of locked up and stopped everything,” Prezioso said.

Prezioso began chest compressions, while staffers and golfers helped cut Hunt’s shirt away and cleared the area for police and ambulance crews. Marshall readied a defibrillator he pulled off the wall about five feet from where Hunt fell.

In between compressions, Prezioso followed the defibrillator’s instructions, shocking Hunt twice before his pulse returned.

By the time the ambulance arrived, Hunt was breathing on his own. He was treated at Waterbury Hospital.

Prezioso, 34, who lives in Southbury, is good friends with Hunt’s son and often plays golf with the Hunts, he said. Judicial marshals are trained annually in first aid, CPR and defibrillation, and Prezioso has served for 16 years, making the experience of saving a life seem routine while it was happening, Prezioso said.

“I actually stayed very calm,” Prezioso said. “It was exactly like how the training videos are.”

Only after they loaded Hunt into the ambulance did the weight of the event kick in, Prezioso said.

“I’m not an emotional person, I never am, and I cried that whole day,” Prezioso said.

Prezioso has already received one award for helping to save a man in 2008 who had a seizure in the courthouse lobby. His latest act of heroism is not surprising, said Anthony Candido, the chief judicial marshal at the courthouse.

“Chris is the kind of person, whether it’s good or bad, you can depend on,” Candido said.

Hunt, 67, lives in the borough with his wife, Diane, and retired last year after 44 years on the borough police force. Two of his sons, Ronald and Steven, live in the borough and work for the same department as sergeant and lieutenant, respectively.

His oldest son, 46-year-old Thomas Hunt Jr., was on his way from his Waterbury home to meet his father for golf Sunday when he got a call about the heart attack.

“The doctor said if it wasn’t for him being in that place, at that time, with people who knew what to do and do immediately, he probably wouldn’t be where he is now,” said Thomas Hunt Jr., who is a counselor supervisor at Garner Correctional Institution in Newtown. “We’re truly blessed.”

A middle-aged man who collapsed during a basketball game at the Hyde Community Center in Newton last week was revived thanks to an automatic defibrillator that had been installed there through the efforts of a local doctor.

According to a police report, the man was standing on the sideline drinking a bottle of water when he suddenly collapsed.

Two friends who also participated in the adult basketball league immediately began performing CPR on the man, Newton police spokesman Bruce Apotheker said. One, Celtics strength and conditioning coach Bryan Doo, grabbed the automated external defibrillator (AED), a simple-to-use machine that is designed for bystanders and bridges the critical moments between the beginning of cardiac arrhythmia and the arrival of paramedics.

Doo connected the AED, which detected an arrhythmia and applied one shock to the man. By the time police arrived just before 10 p.m. last Wednesday night, the man had a pulse.

A spokesman for Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, where the man was transported, said he was in stable condition. The man, reached in his room, did not wish to release his name but was responsive.

Credit is now being given not just to the man’s friends who applied CPR, but also to a nearby doctor whose successful lobbying for the AED’s installation proved life-saving.

Dr. Matthew Shuster, a geriatrician with Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates, lives just across a field from the Hyde Community Center. He said he has frequented the various basketball leagues that rent the court on weeknights for years.

After friend Stu Williams passed away in 2001 while playing basketball in a Newton league, Shuster pressed for various athletic venues in town to install AED machines.

“It took three or four years,” Shuster said, “but we decided after that we had to have the machine, to honor his memory and use it if necessary.”

A machine was donated to the Hyde (as it’s called by regulars) in 2005, and Shuster assumed the responsibility of maintaining the machine, periodically updating its software, checking the pads, changing the batteries and running diagnostic tests.

That diligent maintenance paid off in a big way last week.

“We feel really great that we were able to help save somebody’s life,” Shuster said, also crediting Doo, who was trained on the use of AEDs.

Shuster said that while the machines are not magic bullets, they are a vital tool in managing heart attacks, where every passing second means an increased risk of permanent brain damage or death.

A Covington teenager suffered a heart attack in the woods last Monday. His friends, using CPR and some quick thinking, saved his life.

Brandon Hopper collapsed near Greenwater on Monday, and after more than 2 hours of CPR, he’s made a miraculous recovery.

Kierstyn Frederick and Austin Bourbonnie say they both learned CPR in school. Never did they think they’d need it to save their friends life.

“Honestly, I think I did what any old friend should do,” says Bourbonnie. “As soon as everything happened, everything that I remember learning started clicking in,” says Frederick. “It was a natural reaction I had to do it.”

19 year old Hopper suffers from a genetic heart condition but had never gone into cardiac arrest before Monday. The three friends were hiking in the woods taking pictures of elk when Hooper fell to the ground. He wasn’t breathing.

“He’s not responding to me he’s not responding to any of us, and I didn’t know what to think. I was freaking out,” says Frederick,

“I’m thinking I might have held my best friend in my arms for the last time,” says Bourbonnie. He started CPR while Frederick went to flag down a car since their cell phones had no reception.

They continued breaths and chest compressions for 25 minutes until paramedics arrived and took over.

“I can’t stop appreciating how many right things happened,” says Brandon’s mom, Michelle Hooper.

His parents say, on the way to Harborview, Hopper got more than 2 hours of CPR and shocked with the defibrillator 8 times.

“They’re always going to be on our Christmas card list, and they’re going to be friends of our family forever,” says Troy Hopper, Brandon’s father, of the two friends.

The Covington teenager isn’t out of the woods yet, but doctors removed his breathing tube today and he’s alert and talking.

“Seeing Brandon in the hospital now, I’m really happy he’s still here,” says Frederick.

She took CPR in high school. Bourbonnie says he flunked it in 7th grade, but between the two of them, they knew enough to save their friend’s life.

Hopper’s parents say doctors tell them the longest documented case where a person has received CPR and made a full recovery was 96 minutes. They’re still checking a few details, but if he makes a full recovery it could be a record.

It was a gloomy day at the golf course. Upper 40s and windy.

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“It kind of looked like it might rain,” said Chris Edmondson, assistant manager of the golf course at Lake of the Woods in Mahomet.

James Brandenburg the Survivor

Only nine players had come through as of 1:45 p.m. April 4. That’s about the time the phone rang.

Dave Sebestik, assistant golf professional, took the call.

“What?” Edmondson heard Sebestik say. Sebestik hung up and looked at Edmondson.

“Somebody’s down on 17. They called 911 and just wanted to let us know,” Sebestik said.

But the two employees sprang into action.

“I said, ‘Well, we got to get out there,’ and I grabbed the AED, not knowing what was going on. I didn’t know if somebody just fell or what,” Edmondson said. He still doesn’t know why he grabbed it, but the automated external defibrillator was his first thought, just in case it was needed.

Sebestik met Edmondson outside the pro shop with a golf cart. When they reached hole 17, Edmondson saw frequent golfer of Lake of the Woods, James “Jim” Brandenburg, 64, of Mahomet, lying on the ground not breathing. No pulse.

Brandenburg’s playing partners, Mike Wattles and Gary Peterson, both of Mahomet, were administering CPR.

“I told them to step away, because we could hook up the AED,” Edmondson said. “When you put it on, it walks you through. It’s kind of foolproof.”

Edmondson and other nonseasonal employees of the Champaign County Forest Preserve District are trained to operate AEDs as well as practice full first aid.

“I opened it up and put the pads on,” Edmondson continued. “It checked all the vitals, and it said, ‘Administer shock.’

“I told everybody to just kind of stand back and pushed the button. (Jim) gave a little jump and a breath, and I felt he had a little pulse going.”

The AED checked Brandenburg’s vitals again, and it said, “No shock required,” which meant his heart was going.

“Right then, the Cornbelt and EMTs showed up, and they took over CPR. The ambulance showed up, and they got him to the hospital,” Edmonson said.

“During the whole time, I really wasn’t thinking at all, I was just doing what needed to be done as far as I thought, and until the ambulance pulled away, that was when it hit me,” he said. “It kind of was all reaction.”

And it seems it was that way for Brandenburg’s playing partners, Wattles and Peterson, too.

Peterson said the group had just teed off and was half way to the green on 17 — a long par 3 — when he heard a thud behind him. When he turned around, Brandenburg was on the ground.

“It was scary as heck,” he said, noting Brandenburg turned a little blue.

The two friends immediately acted, with Wattles calling 911 and Peterson rolling him on his back to start CPR. Peterson said he had no recent training in CPR, but did what he could.

Wattles had taken a voluntary training program in CPR before, but said 911 dispatchers walked them through what to do to resuscitate Brandenburg.

Wattles said Edmondson then showed up with the defibrillator.

“We were quite frightened, of course,” Wattles said. “I’ve been around death before, but they were in the hospital. Just to have somebody on the ground right there in front of you opens your eyes to how quickly you can be gone without necessarily any symptoms. You need to make your peace with God everyday. I have a strong faith. I certainly prayed for Jim and his family.”

Peterson called his wife, Sharon, who picked up Brandenburg’s wife, Patricia, who met the group at the ambulance.

Patricia rode in the front seat of the Arrow Ambulance and directed them to Provena.

All the way to the hospital, she prayed.

“I can’t imagine my life without him,” she said, noting the two met when they were 14 years old in Watseka. They have been married 45 years.

When they got to the hospital, emergency room doctors took him to heart surgery, where they found he had two block arteries and a third almost entirely blocked. He had a triple bypass as a result.

Patricia called both her sons, who both came as fast as they could. Brad Brandenburg lives in Tampa, Fla., and James Brandenburg, who is in the Air Force, lives in Carlisle, Pa.

“That was the longest day of my life,” Patricia said, noting Gary and Sharon Peterson stayed at the hospital with her until 2 a.m.

Brandenburg woke up the next evening in intensive care.

He said he could hear a nurse named Ted urging him to wake up and telling him he had a heart attack.

Brandenburg’s first reaction was, “You got to be kidding me.”

He said he didn’t recall feeling any pain. He didn’t feel jaw pain or leg pain or arm pain.

“I was playing golf,” he said. “I just hit the ball and the other guy hit his ball, and then we started walking toward the 17th green. And that was it.”

But Brandenburg said he doesn’t remember much of the day — only getting dressed that morning and the first hole.

He did not sustain other injuries or brain damage — even though he jokingly said that was in question before anyway.

“It was unbelievable,” he said. “But everybody was involved.”

Right after the event, the Champaign County Forest Preserve District added two more defibrillators.

They now are near the tower at Lake of the Woods, the golf course, Museum of the Grand Prairie, the maintenance shop at Lake of the Woods, and Middlefork and Homer forest preserves.

“All of these people contributed to me being alive today,” Brandenburg said. “But (Edmondson) was No. 1 as far as starting this heart, because it had stopped.”

He hopes others might hear his story and encourage them to purchase defibrillators for their establishments.

“I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for that,” he said.

The White Tigers hosted San Marcos High Tech High in a tournament game on Dec. 8, 2010, Wes Schultz , a sophomore, had been competing with another player for playing time. Escondido Charter coach Keith Jackson had told both players that whomever demonstrated better defensive skills would play the most.

Jordan Schultz the Survivor

“Jordan demonstrated better defense,” Jackson said. “So he would have been playing a lot for us this year.”

Although Jordan didn’t start the game, he was on the floor late in the first quarter when Escondido Charter put a little run together, forcing High Tech to call a timeout.

Said Jackson: “He (Jordan) was flowing.”

Lori Schultz was sitting in the stands with Jodi Rea, the mother of a player on the opposing team. They got to know each other when Jordan and Rea’s son, Andy, played together on a soccer team a few years earlier.

After the buzzer signaled the timeout, Rea, a registered nurse, noticed one of the players appear to trip and fall as he joined the others filing back to their benches.

“She said, ‘Ooh, that kid just went down,’” Lori Schultz recalled. “And I looked, and it took me a few seconds to register that it was Jordan. I just figured he’d twisted his knee, because he was moving around a little bit.”

In the span of mere seconds, less time than it takes for players to leave the court and sit on the bench for a timeout, everything changed.

Over the next several minutes Jordan’s life hung in the balance. Time was precious.

Jackson saw the fall, and also thought it was a trip. But the former Marine, who took part in Desert Storm, observed that Jordan remained face down. Jackson initially observed that Jordan wasn’t moving, and turned him over. Then Jackson noticed small movements.

It looked, Jackson said, like Jordan was having a seizure. His bladder had emptied and his eyes were rolling back in his head. His Marine training dictated the next move. Jackson took out his phone and called 9-1-1.

Rea got out to Jordan and almost immediately directed Lori Schultz to call 9-1-1, too.

“It’s hard to believe that it’s actually something bad happening,” Lori Schultz said. “That he’s not just going to jump up. So it took a few seconds to realize that, hey, this is actually happening.”

After beginning compressions, Rea asked if anybody else knew CPR. Teammate Luke Portillo, a friend who had played video games with Jordan, stepped forward.

“For the previous couple months I was taking a program here at Charter called fire technology,” Portillo said. “They just taught me, like the month before that, how to give CPR. And when it all happened, I saw a lady trying to give him CPR … and I ran over there.”

Portillo, whose parents had both been combat medics, took over the compressions while Rea concentrated on Jordan’s pulse. Portillo’s mom, Angie, had come down and was monitoring Jordan’s pulse, which was weak.

Jordan was in cardiac arrest. To this day, the Schultzes don’t know what caused it.

“I’ve been teaching and coaching for 45 different years,” Escondido Charter executive director Denny Snyder said. “That was the scariest thing I’ve ever seen.”

Five minutes, 15 seconds after Lori Schultz placed the call to 9-1-1, the paramedics arrived. She said they are trained to keep the call open until they make visual contact, then hang up.

Jackson said Jordan’s pulse stopped three times as he lay on the court.

The paramedics hit him twice with a defibrillator, then transported him to Palomar Hospital. Later that night, Jordan was taken by helicopter to Rady’s Children’s Hospital in San Diego.

Jackson said that he talked to a paramedic that night who said that the work of the people on the scene might have saved Jordan’s life, and at the least, took action that would hasten his recovery.

“Everybody that came in and was there kept their poise,” Snyder said.

Jordan spent two days in a coma. Then he woke up.

“I didn’t know what day it was,” Jordan said. “I didn’t know where I was, didn’t know what was going on. I had no idea what happened. It’s a weird feeling. I woke up and they rushed to my bed, like, ‘You’re alive.’ ”

Jordan still has no recollection of the events of that day or the day before. The last thing he remembers was going to the game two nights earlier.

Escondido Charter honored him as its most inspirational player last Thursday. In presenting Jordan for the award, Jackson alluded to his “medical issue,” but said little else about the events of Dec. 8.

“If you don’t think that’s inspirational, you don’t know what inspiration is,” Jackson said. Then he introduced Jordan. The mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers seated around cafeteria tables rose for a standing ovation.

Jordan eventually recovered enough to play in the team’s final game, missing two shots but grabbing a rebound in 6 minutes of action. And he is very determined to rejoin the team next year, when he is a junior.

His recovery was remarkably quick given the nature of his condition. Jordan was released from the hospital after two weeks, though he still had trouble with simple tasks such as walking from his bedroom to the bathroom, at that point. It was nearly two months before he returned to school.

Even now, Jordan notices that his handwriting is still a little sloppy. But his grip is strong when he shakes hands and he speaks of his ordeal in a clear, steady voice.

He was asked if he thought about basketball while he was laid up.

“The whole time,” he answered.

Wes Schultz laughed.

“That was one of the first things we did is go out (to the backyard basketball court),” he said. “… Jordan wanted to play.”

Portillo said that his friend doesn’t talk about the incident much. But not too long ago, while they were sitting in the bleachers watching another game, the topic came up.

“He was like, ‘Dude, I owe you my life,’ ” Portillo said. “I was like, ‘Man, you don’t owe me anything. I’m just glad you’re here.’ We just left it at that.”