First Aid Corps

County of Simcoe Paramedic Services responded to a call for assistance at the Nottawasaga Inn – Centre Ice Arena, Alliston after a 44-year old man collapsed after playing hockey.

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Staff came immediately to his aid performing CPR to revive the man and called 911.

An Automated External Defibrillator was used and the man was revived.

Paramedics took over the life-saving measures and transported the man to a local sent to Southlake Hospital, Newmarket for cardiac care. Reports claim that the man is now recovering.

Off-duty Bonita Springs firefighter John Kutz, 26, was participating in a pickup hockey game when a 56-year-old man collapsed on the ice at Germain Arena.

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Kutz said the man began turning blue and was unresponsive.

John Kutz the Saviour

“I took off his helmet, opened his airway, checked for pulses, didn’t get any of that. Then just started CPR on him and then called for the AED and the guys knew where it was – thank God they had one. We shocked him one time, then continued CPR after that and the guy kind-of woke up a little bit.”

“His eyes opened and he pushed our hands away from him,” Kutz said.

Kutz reported that the victim was breathing when Estero Fire rescuers arrived on the scene and began performing advanced life support on the man, while Kutz assisted.

By the time Lee County Emergency Management Services arrived, Kutz said the man was “almost fully alert.”

Lee County Emergency Management Services took the man to Lee Memorial, said Debbi Redfield, spokeswoman for Bonita Springs Fire district.

Kutz also noted that well-trained Estero responders and his training might have saved the victim’s life.

“It was just a job well done by everyone,” he said.

Ross White, the manager of the Stephenville Dome, was sitting in his office doing some paperwork when he heard the alarm go off on the defibrillator cabinet and went to a window that overlooks the ice and noticed everyone gathered by the players’ box.

Ross White the Saviour

He immediately left his office and on the way down met Dave Boudreau, an employee at the arena, and told him to follow. They went over to the bench and that’s where this man was lying on the floor with Monty Drake and Brian Roberts, two of the hockey players, doing cardiopulmonary resuscitation on him.

“They told me what had happened, that the man had collapsed after getting off the ice and saying he wasn’t feeling so well, so I checked for breathing and a pulse, and not finding either, I got ready to use the automated external defibrillator on him,” he said.

This device basically tells you what to do according to White, so once the paddles were attached the machine informed him the man had no pulse and wasn’t breathing and to stand clear and get ready to shock him.

White said with this all done he pressed the button and the man jolted up and immediately regained consciousness. He said he only had to shock him once.

With a crowd gathered around it was difficult to hear the machine and he said it was great that Boudreau was repeating everything the machine had to say to him.

He said it was shortly after the ambulance arrived and the man was still conscious and brought to the Sir Thomas Roddick Hospital, where he has been since.

“It didn’t really feel like I had done anything extraordinary, but the more people talk about it the more I realize how close we were to losing him,” he said. I hope I never have to do it again, but it’s good to know the defibrillator is there if we need it.”

“I probably wouldn’t have said it before, but now after using the defibrillator — yes, it’s a very big deal when you see it save a person’s life,” White said.

Harvey Thien, a participant in Nanaimo’s senior scrub hockey program, collapsed unconscious on the bench at the Cliff McNabb Arena in Beban Park on April 9.

Fortunately, a number of retired firefighters, including Ted Greves and Keith MacDonald, were also playing hockey at the time and used one of the recently installed automated external defibrillators at the arena to resuscitate Thien.

Thien was airlifted to Victoria, where he underwent bypass surgery and is now recuperating.

“He looked to me like he was gone by the time we got to (Thien),” Greves said of the incident.

“Having that defibrillator close at hand saved his life because I don’t think he would have made it otherwise. It was wonderful to see him come back to life.

Al Murphy, 62, retired ranger for the Chelan Ranger District, was participating in the Co-Ed Jamboree recreational hockey tournament this weekend. He was playing in his fifth game of the tournament, and third game of the day, when he went into cardiac arrest.

Al Murphy (bottom right) the Survivor

He just happened to be sitting next to teammate Dr. Lisa Petersen of Wenatchee, who started CPR when she could not find a pulse.

Players and spectators watched in horror. She continued the life-saving efforts until paramedics arrived and restarted his heart with a portable defibrillator.

Murphy regained consciousness Tuesday and was in serious condition this morning. His wife, Nanc and sons Taber and Corbin have been with him.

Randy Poel, a sergeant with the Grand Haven Department of Public Safety, went into cardiac arrest and collapsed while playing hockey at Lakeshore Sports Centre in Fruitport Township on Feb. 21.

Randy Poel the Survivor

Capt. Nathan Morgan of the Muskegon Township Fire Department used the arena’s AED to shock Poel’s heart back to life.

Poel than was taken to a hospital. He has since recovered.

“If it wasn’t for the AED and Nate Morgan, the doctors said that 100 percent beyond a doubt my husband would’ve died,” Lisa Poel said.

“I don’t want anyone to have to go through losing a family member over something that inexpensive,” Lisa said.

Lakeshore Sports Centre Manager Jason Goodell said the arena has had an AED on site for almost four years. It was donated by Scott Wilbur, a customer who thought the business ought to have one.

“He’s received a lot of ‘thank yous’ over the past few weeks,” said Goodell, who wasn’t at the arena when Poel collapsed.

“When I got the call from my assistant, the first thing I asked was, ‘Did you guys use the defibrillator?’?” he said.

Lisa Poel is grateful her husband was playing hockey with firefighters and police officers, all of whom had been trained in the use of AEDs.

He can’t recall the first man’s name, but Etobicoke hockey arena senior operator Art Jones said “he’s back playing hockey” and they regularly chat.

Art Jones the Saviour

“He just went down on the ice, but a couple of the guys are city workers and realized what was happening,” he said.

Doug Clancy, then manager of an arena at Erindale College, joined him doing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, but they feared “we were going to lose him.”

Jones, who trained on the defibrillator about one month earlier, fetched the portable unit and got the victim’s heart beating with one jolt before paramedics arrived.

“I was at the other end of the lobby with my partner, Marco, and I just said ‘call 911′ and we started running and I grabbed the defibrillator and in I went,” he said, noting the arena has two public access defibrillators on-site for such incidents.

When Jones arrived at the scene, he found a 52-year-old regular named Wally down on the ice – unconscious, but still breathing.

“When I got over to (Wally) I started pulling out the unit and got his shirt up just in case he went down and, sure enough, he started going blue and stopped breathing. I had to slap the pads on his chest and hit him with a jolt,” Jones recalled.

With just the one reviving jolt, Wally’s eyes fluttered, his heart restarted and he was breathing again, albeit with laboured breaths, Jones said.

Friends were preparing to do mouth-to-mouth and chest compressions Thursday, but Jones intervened. “He’s going to be okay,” he said.

Grateful at the recognition, especially from arena regulars, he stressed “it’s important for people to realize the units are there, and to get training. Seconds count. If you can save a life, that’s what it’s all about.”

Paul Chaisson, 52, of Halifax said he started to feel dizzy while skating across the ice a little after midnight on Jan. 20 at the Centennial Arena.

“I saw the lights were getting funny and I knew I was going down,” Chaisson said Monday. “So I braced myself for it, and that was it.”

A paramedic from the opposing team rushed to his side, as did his teammate, Dr. Kirk Magee, who happens to be an ER doctor.

“As I got closer, Ken said he wasn’t breathing,” Magee said. “So we turned him over, and we called for the defibrillator.”

The assistant manager rushed for the defibrillator that’s kept at the arena.

The arena manager gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, while the experts did CPR and used the defibrillator.

Within minutes, they had a pulse.

Coming to, Chaisson still had his mind on the game.

“My teammates were all hovered around me and I wanted to get up right away. And the first thing I said to them [was]: ‘Did they call the game?’”

Chaisson plans to sit out the rest of the season will still be on the sidelines.

“As soon as I’m released from hospital, I’ll go back to the rink,” he said. And he doesn’t plan to stay away from playing hockey for too long.

“I can’t stay off the ice. It’s just in my blood,” he said, adding he loves “the camaraderie, the games, the fun, the exercise — the whole thing.”

Derek Robison, a Weymouth firefighter since 2006 and a certified emergency medical technician, 38, was watching the hockey game of his 6-year-old son, Donovan, when a man wearing hockey skates came rushing out from one of the other rinks shortly before 5 p.m. Sunday.

He was looking for a doctor.

“He said someone needed help,” Robison said.

Robison and a nurse, whose daughter plays on his son’s Weymouth Youth Hockey team, ran over to see what they could do.

“Someone said he (McCracken) had just come off the ice when he collapsed near the bench,” Robison said.

Others had gathered around retired police Lt. Joseph McCracken, 65, and were trying to help him when the unidentified nurse and Robison pitched in with their life-saving efforts.

The nurse and the firefighter used CPR to keep retired police Lt. Joseph McCracken, 65, alive with blood flowing to his heart and brain.

That’s when a pro-shop worker, Derek Benton saw what was going on, suspected the victim was suffering from a heart attack and knew the nearest defibrillator unit was across the street at the Queen Anne Nursing home. “I just bolted out the door, “said Benton. “I knew he needed the de-fib unit.”

“I put one pad on one side of his chest,” said Duxbury firefighter Jim Kittredge,” and Sharon Demio put the other pad near his heart.”

A Hingham Fire Department ambulance arrived minutes later to take McCracken to South Shore Hospital in Weymouth, where he was listed in good condition Tuesday.

Hoby Taylor, Pilgrim’s president, said McCracken has been renting ice time for men’s hockey games for many years.

“He’s a very, very nice man,” Taylor said. “It’s very rare that something like this happens.”

“I can’t say thank you enough to the people who helped my father,” said Lisa McCracken, the daughter of Joe McCracken, who had a heart attack while playing hockey over the weekend.

“We did what we were trained to do,” Robison said.

It was near the end of the final hockey game of the season for a group of Nanaimo oldtimers hockey players and one that would forever change the life of Paul Walters.

The 52-year-old harbour patrol captain had enjoyed the sport for four decades and was nearing the end of the Dec. 21 matchup when he felt an intense pain in his chest that he thought might be attributed to his asthma.

Walters recalls lacking the classic heart attack symptoms, such as shooting pain down an arm or chest and told his team he was packing in for the night when he felt sick.

His chest pain intensified and as he changed in the dressing room, he told someone to grab fellow player Dave Sheepwash, an off-duty paramedic also trained in advanced life support.

Sheepwash asked someone to call 911 just as Walters collapsed and stopped breathing.

Sheepwash and players Jeff Braun and Pat O’Dwyer took turns administering CPR and used the AED ( automated external defibrillator ) which was available at the Nanaimo Ice Centre which was fitted in late 2008, as they waited for paramedics.

It took five hours to stabilize Walters, who was transported to a Victoria hospital where he learned an artery was badly blocked. After surgery he was moved back to Nanaimo Regional General Hospital and released on Boxing Day. He will continue his recovery at home.

It is a happy Christmas story for Walters but the incident has given life a new meaning for the active father, who only three weeks earlier had received a good bill of health after a routine physical.

“My thoughts are now to take fitness more seriously,” said Walters on Saturday. “You get your life back and you find out you have so many friends. I’m very humbled by the reaction I’ve had.”