First Aid Corps

A man who suffered a heart attack in Ottawa’s Britannia Park was lucky that 85 members of the Canadian Ski Patrol were upgrading their CPR training in the park

“Somebody came in who had spoken to some of the patrollers earlier in the day and was interested in what we were doing — they came back in and said ‘Someone is dying outside in the park.’ And of course there was almost 100 of us here that could’ve gone out and checked out the situation,” Chisamore said.

The man, between 40 and 50 years of age, had been playing volleyball. He collapsed following the game and was not breathing and had no pulse.

The lifesaving recertification course suddenly became a real life emergency.

“So it was fortunate we were here,” said Chisamore.

Patrollers took one of their many defibrillators to the man in cardiac arrest and while waiting for paramedics to arrive, the ski patrollers shocked him with the defibrillator and did CPR.

By the time the ambulance arrived “the patient was gaining colour and that’s the best outcome,” Chisamore said.

Joe Camucci, who oversees paramedic services for the City of Ottawa, said timing is of the essence in these types of emergencies.

That’s why the municipality offer free CPR training to anyone who wants it and installs defibrillators in all public buildings, he said.

“If you want to have a cardiac arrest, do it on public property because your chance of being saved is 70 per cent,” he said.

Chisamore said the heart attack victim had good vital signs by Sunday night and was scheduled to be transferred to the Ottawa Hospital Heart Institute for followup care.

Longtime golf partners Ray Gee and Bill Gorman have never known their leisurely Friday night golf league to hold quite so much drama. But, on August 13th, the 8th hole of Conklin Players Club in Conklin, NY, became the scene of a lifesaving rescue when Gee collapsed from sudden cardiac arrest.

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According to Conklin Players Club Owner Theresa Rickard, when Gee collapsed, Gorman immediately started administering CPR, while another golfer, Matt Smith, ran to the clubhouse to retrieve the automated external defibrillator (AED) at the clubhouse.

Gorman, a 29-year volunteer fireman for the Conklin Fire Department, then defibrillated Gee, while Brian Bailey, another member of their foursome, administered chest compressions.

Rickard said, “We’ve had the AED for a couple of years, but have never had to use it. We had it in the lobby – just in case – and I’m so thankful that we did.”

Gee, a structural steel draftsman who resides in Binghamton, NY, and Gorman, an electrician who lives in Conklin, have been friends for 30 years. Gee said, “I’m very lucky that Bill was my partner. Not only is he a great golf partner, but he’s a great human being. He just took complete control of everything.”

Gorman said, “I was a First Responder years ago, and I did have CPR and defibrillator training. But that AED was so easy to use, it didn’t matter. Between the CPR, the defibrillator and the quick response of the ambulance, it was the perfect storm – in a good way.”

On June 10, while visiting friends in Goshen, New Hampton resident Dean Ouderkirk suffered a heart attack.

Dean Ouderkirk the Survivor

He was returning home from a reception for Occupations’ president and CEO. But before hopping on Route 17, he decided to say hello to his good friend, Joe Bayno, who resides on Fletcher Street in Goshen.

Bayno says Ouderkirk would often stop in for a cranberry juice and club soda after running afternoon errands in Goshen — but it was highly unusual for him to do so in the evening.

“We went out to the patio. He sat down — and went straight backward,” Bayno says. “His eyes were staring up at the sky. He was not breathing.”

Bayno immediately reached for his cell phone, which is always with him — he doesn’t have a land line — and didn’t lose a second dialing 911. He was instructed to put one hand under Ouderkirk’s head to prevent it from slamming into the concrete floor as he began forceful chest compressions with the other.

“I was banging his chest with a flat hand as hard as I could,” says Bayno. “I must have done it at least 50 times.”

Officer Christopher Smoulcey of the Village of Goshen Police Department was behind the track at the Harness Racing Museum — less than a minute away — when the medical call came through. Officer James M. Malgieri was on Greenwich Street.

“I had the defibrillator with me in the front seat,” says Smoulcey, who grabbed it as he left his car and ran to Bayno’s front door. There was no response, so he went to the screen door on the side house, where he was able to see Bayno kneeling over Ouderkirk. Malgieri arrived shortly thereafter.

Smoulcey unzipped the AED (automated external defibrillator), donated by Marie Durland on behalf of the Pennings Family in 2002. He then opened the packet with the adult defibrillator pads and electrodes. He affixed one to the lower left abdomen area and the other to the upper right shoulder.

“Mr. Ouderkirk was not breathing. There was no pulse. He was blue in the face and had a glassy stare,” says Malgieri. “Joe Bayno did a good job by listening to the instructions he was given when he called 911.”

Smoulcey continued connecting Ouderkirk to the AED. “It analyzes the heart rhythms, and if it detects a shockable rhythm, it directs that you hit the button to administer the shock,” says Smoulcey.

Ouderkirk was shocked twice.

“I did CRP and rescue breaths for a good 10 minutes,” says Malgieri. “There was a gasp, but no pulse, and he was still not breathing.”

Within a few minutes, a paramedic from Mobile Life arrived, soon followed by the ambulance.

“The two cops and I watched as they worked on him,” says Bayno. “They continued with chest compressions.”

And Ouderkirk was shocked twice more.

After a good half-hour, says Smoulcey, Ouderkirk was lifted onto a stretcher, placed into the ambulance and rushed to the emergency room at Orange Regional Medical Center’s Middletown campus.

The defibrillator that was used to save Oudrkirk’s life was donated to the department by the Pennings family, in memory of their brother, Richard Pennings. During Richard’s illness, many friends and relatives donated to a medical fund in his name. After the loss of Richard, the family, Dr. Nick Pennings, Dr. Anthony Pennings, Margaret Hawkins and Marie Durland, donated the defibrillator to the department using those funds.

Ouderkirk and his fiancée, Carole Syverson, came to the Village of Goshen Police Department on Aug. 13 to meet and express their thanks to people who had a part in saving his life.

Dean and Carol’s celebration of life will culminate this April, when they will be married.

“Carol and I are looking forward to our wedding in April. It will be a celebration of life,” he says.

“There’s clearly something left for him to do in this world — besides marry me,” says Syverson. “Maybe part of it is to let people know what wonderful care is available in Orange County.”

The members of the Village Of Goshen Police Department congratulate them and wish them many years of health and happiness together.

Gary Fratus, who celebrated his 52nd birthday last week, was loading trucks for his North Main Street heating and air conditioning business around 8 a.m. July 1 when he collapsed because of a cardiac arrhythmia.

His son, Scott, ran next door to the North Randolph fire station for help.

The shift was changing at the time, and the five firefighters inside rushed to the man’s aid, grabbing the emergency medical equipment from the department’s Engine 4.

Firefighter/paramedic Thomas Binnall, the department’s emergency medical coordinator, said when firefighters reached the elder Fratus, he “was not breathing and had no pulse.”

Gary Fratus said he was told “I was clinically dead.”

Binnall said firefighters used a defibrillator to administer a single shock, restoring Fratus’ pulse before the ambulance arrived to take him to Good Samaritan Medical Center in Brockton.

“It’s a miracle that it happened,” Scott Fratus said. “Every single doctor said the same thing, ‘You don’t know how lucky you are.’”

A Pearl City J.V. football player collapsed during practice today, but thanks to a fast acting trainer he was able to be revived.

The team’s coach says a 9th-grade offensive tackle, was doing hitting drills head-to-head with another player when he suddenly collapsed.

A trainer at the practice ran to grab an automated external defibrillator or AED.

“Once we realized he stopped breathing, the trainer was right there right by the hill so his quick response actually helped save him,” said J.V. headcoach Jerry Arrayan.

“We hooked him up and he started coming around but i still had to do some CPR and eventually the pulse came back,” said athelectic heath care trainer Colin Lee.

The player was taken to the hospital in serious condition.

James Fuller, 27, said he can’t remember anything of that morning but it was a typical Monday – he arrived at work at the South Colonnade offices, checked his emails and then went to a meeting.

James Fuller the Survivor

Moments later he collapsed in his chair.

“A couple of colleagues helped me,” he said. “One was trained in CPR a number of years ago and she sprang into action. Another knew first aid and had the emergency services on the phone giving advice.”

Within minutes, a motorcycle paramedic, fast response car paramedic, a cycle paramedic and an ambulance crew arrived.

They gave James two shocks with a defibrillator and his heartbeat returned.

He was taken to hospital and discharged a few weeks later after doctors had fitted him with a cardioverter defibrillator.

James, now 28, has since made a full recovery and moved to a new job in London Bridge, but he has made a point of keeping in touch with the colleagues he owes his life to.

He said: “I’ve seen both of them a couple of times since and it’s a fantastic thing that they were able to help me. I’ve heard there’s been an uptake of people taking on CPR training in that firm and there’s also been some defibrillators put in the building.”

Speaking about the reunion with the paramedics, James said: “Not being able to remember what happened that day, it was fantastic to meet up with all the ambulance staff that were involved in person – I can’t speak highly enough of them.

“They do an amazing job and they are all absolute heroes in my book.

“I left hospital less than a month later and returned to my life without any real lasting consequences. I can only attribute that to my colleagues being able to provide CPR and to the ambulance staff for everything they did.”

It was Friday afternoon at the Hampton Inn on Lee Burbank Highway, a lazy summer Friday.

An alarm had gone off at the hotel in error, and firefighters had responded around 4:30 p.m. and quickly determined it was nothing of concern.

As they were leaving though, Capt. Glen Rich and Firefighter Tony DiGiovanni noticed a woman in distress in the lobby.

She was having chest pains, but told firefighters to leave her alone and she’d be fine.

Seconds later she collapsed and went into full cardiac arrest.

The two firefighters immediately hit the floor, performing CPR as the woman slipped closer and closer to death.

The rest of the Engine 4 crew, under the direction of Deputy Chief Jim Cullen, quickly retrieved a defibrillator unit from the engine and brought it to aid Rich and DiGiovanni.

Time was running out as they hooked the woman up to the unit.

The automated unit immediately flashed a command to shock the woman ASAP.

They charged the defibrillator unit. They applied a massive shock to the woman.

She immediately sat up and gasped for air, clinging back to a life she nearly lost.

The firefighters also gasped, breathing a sigh of relief as it hit them that they had just saved the woman’s life.

Cataldo Ambulance transported the woman to the Mass General in Boston, where she received further treatment.

“This woman was extremely fortunate that things played out the way they did,” said Chief Gene Doherty. “It was only coincidence that we were there for the alarm when she went into cardiac arrest. It was a real good save and extremely lucky that we were there at that exact moment.”

The chief commended the entire Engine 4 and Ladder 1 crews for an extremely well-executed job.

Mount Airy fire engineer Scotty Wolfe Wolfe had just finished his shift and was running errands when he heard the 911 operator dispatch crews to a job site on Oak Grove Church Road.

Scotty Wolfe the Saviour, Ron Haynes the Survivor

When Wolfe arrived, he found a man lying on the ground who wasn’t breathing and had no pulse, so he began CPR.

A few minutes later, when someone said the man’s name, Wolfe realized he was trying to revive his lifelong friend, Ron Haynes.

“My heart sunk a little bit. My adrenaline rose, and I just kept working,” Wolfe said.

Workers witnessed Haynes, 34, fall to the ground after being electrocuted when he tried to plug in a fan to dry newly poured concrete.

After 12 minutes of performing CPR, a shock to Haynes’ heart from a defibrillator brought him back to life.

“I was an emotional wreck. I cried,” Wolfe said as the ambulance raced his friend to Wake Forest Baptist University Medical Center.

Wolfe said he was scared Haynes might not make it. “I could see his little boy like mine growing up without a father,” said Wolfe.

Haynes described what happened a miracle and said he’s thankful to have such a great friend.

“I told him if it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t be here that’s for sure, ” said Haynes.

The day after the July floods, Terry Lee entered the Germantown store and never made it to the sump pumps.

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Lee says, “When I hit the floor. I just totally blacked out. Don’t know what happened, and they took over from there. They have their defibrillator in the store here. The went through their code blue.”

Manager Tom Pfeifer, and his trained staff first performed the newest recommended heart attack technique called “Heart Saver”.

“Paramedic service, they came here in 5-6 minutes. We had minimal time with you initially until they came.”

In those minutes Lee flat lined, which led to him being shocked by an automated external defibrillator.

Allan Bealing and Caroline Marshall, from Wellington Free Ambulance, were waiting in a queue at Burger King in Courtenay Place about 2am on August 1 when Mr Ilton, who was across the road, suddenly collapsed.

Josh Ilton the Survivor

Recognising something was seriously wrong when Mr Ilton collapsed, his friend put him in the recovery position and dialled 111. Onlookers rushed over the street to get the paramedics, who quickly identified the signs of cardiac arrest.

“Josh had agonal respirations, [irregular breathing], sounding a bit like loud gasping or snoring,” Mr Bealing said.

Because of a large number of intoxicated bystanders, the paramedics transferred Mr Ilton to the back of an ambulance and began performing CPR and shocked him with a defibrillator to try to restart his heart.

A second Wellington Free Ambulance paramedic crew arrived to take him to Wellington Hospital, with Mr Bealing, Ms Marshall and a paramedic student continuing to perform CPR on the way.

Tests have shown no reason for his heart attack but he is scheduled to have an operation today to implant a defibrillator near his heart. “I was really lucky the paramedics worked on me so hard and were in the right place at the right time,” Mr Ilton said.

His mother, Nelma Pearce, was very grateful the paramedics recognised immediately that her son had not just fallen over drunk.

“The fact they were just across the road when Josh collapsed was a massive stroke of luck.”

Mr Bealing said that more often than not a patient did not survive this type of medical emergency.

“He primarily survived because CPR was started so soon after he collapsed and a defibrillator was nearby to deliver the shock that reverted the heart into its normal rhythm.

“Without these key factors he would have been unlikely to survive …”