First Aid Corps

Call it a twist of fate.

Victor Giesbrecht, 61, of Winnipeg, stopped his pickup along an interstate highway in western Wisconsin to help two stranded women change a flat tire. Minutes later, his life was in their hands.

Sara Berg, of Eau Claire, Wis., and her cousin, Lisa Meier, were headed home Saturday night on Interstate 94 when they “heard an awful noise.” They were somewhere between Menomonie and Eau Claire when they pulled to the side of the road with a flat tire — something neither knew how to fix. Meier’s husband was on his way to help when Giesbrecht, who was driving by with his wife, Ann, showed up and asked whether they needed help.

“We were so grateful,” Berg said. “Nowadays, nobody ever really stops to offer their help. It’s kind of scary sometimes, because you really don’t know what you’re getting into.”

Giesbrecht is the type who always wants to stop to help a stranded motorist, his wife said. “He’s the type of person who gives you 100 percent and worries about himself later,” she said.

When Giesbrecht finished, Berg thanked him and they shook hands. Berg recalled Giesbrecht’s farewell words to her: “Someone up above put me in the right place at the right time.’”

And then they parted. Giesbrecht and his wife pulled back onto the interstate. Seconds later, Berg followed.

Less than a quarter mile down the road, Berg noticed Giesbrecht’s red truck pulled over. She passed it and then pulled over herself, figuring the couple may have forgotten something.

No sooner had she gotten out of her car when she saw Giesbrecht’s wife waving frantically at passing motorists.

When she saw Berg, she called out: “I think he’s having a heart attack.”

Berg, a certified nursing assistant trained in CPR, jumped into the truck. Giesbrecht had no pulse and wasn’t breathing. Berg began chest compressions. Meier called 911.

Emergency personnel arrived in about five minutes, “but it always feels like forever at a time like that,” Berg said.

Wisconsin state trooper Kate Sampson arrived first, and gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation while Berg continued the chest compressions. When two Dunn County sheriff’s deputies arrived, they helped move Giesbrecht out of the truck and to the shoulder, using the vehicle as a buffer from passing traffic. Sampson, along with Meier’s husband, who had just arrived, and the deputy resumed CPR while the second deputy used an automated external defibrillator to deliver shocks to his heart.

“It was a nice twist of fate,” said Fernandes, who is treating Giesbrecht at the Eau Claire hospital. “We know for sure that the CPR the woman did increased his chances for survival.”

Berg pointed out that it was a team effort by several people.

The last few days have been a bit emotional for her and her cousin.

“We both have felt kind of guilty that having helped us caused his health issue,” Berg said. “But people keep telling us that maybe it put us in the right place at the right time when he was going to need help.”

Ann Giesbrecht, who was also part of her husband’s good luck when she guided their vehicle to the shoulder during his heart attack, is grateful. According to a statement issued by Mayo Clinic Health System, she talked to Berg on Sunday and told her, “You actually saved his life.”

Everyone else already was there when she walked in for roll call Wednesday evening.

Not only was Bolingbrook Officer Regalado late, one of her boots was caked with mud.

I wasn’t there, but I’m sure one of the cops teased that she’d better have a good excuse.

Seems like she did.

State police report that Regalado — whose first name is not being released — was driving her own car to work on Interstate 355 near Route 6 when a blue minivan behind her veered across the road, into a ditch and up the embankment.

Knowing something was wrong, Regalado stopped and returned to find the elderly driver slumped behind the wheel of the locked van.

She called 911 but handed the ringing phone to another man who had stopped to help and had him relay information to the emergency dispatcher as she tried to open the door.

All the doors were locked, so she told another passerby to get her riot baton from her trunk.

That man got the thrill of using police equipment to break the passenger side window while Regalado unlocked the doors.

As the two men pulled the man onto some nearby grass, the officer ran to get the CPR mouth shield from her work bag.

“The victim did not have a pulse that either she or the other man who knew CPR could feel,” reports said. “He was unconscious, unresponsive and his lips and mouth were starting to turn blue.”

They continued CPR until a state trooper arrived.

Regalado asked the trooper if he was carrying a portable defibrillator in his cruiser and told him to get it.

“At that time (I) applied the patches on the designated areas on the victim … plugged in the cord to the pads and hit the button to begin,” she reported. The device was able to steady the rhythm of the senior’s heart.

An ambulance took the victim to Silver Cross Hospital where he was listed in stable condition after suffering a heart attack, reports said.

Regalado returned to her car and drove to Bolingbrook.

“(I) contacted the sergeant’s desk to advise him of the situation and (that I) may be slightly late to work,” she said.

She’ll be written up for it.

But it’ll be a commendation.

“The department is very proud of Officer Regalado’s heroic response. It is obvious her training and experience played a great role in possibily saving this victim’s life. We commend her for her efforts,” Lt. Mike Rompa said.

Matt Collins was on his way to a business meeting when he saw a school bus drift aimlessly through the intersection of Elm Grove and Bluemound roads just after 8:30 a.m. Sept. 15.

“It appeared nobody was driving,” he said. “I got out and ran up to the bus and figured that I would jump in and stop it.”

When Collins threw open the door, however, he found the driver, a 65-year-old Milwaukee man, slumped over without a pulse and two special needs children aboard.

“I stopped the bus and threw it in park,” he said. “Another guy ran up behind me, and we pulled him out and started to administer CPR.”

An Elm Grove police officer was on the scene within minutes of receiving a 911 call, and used a defibrillator to shock the driver’s heart, Police Chief Jim Gage said.

Elm Grove paramedics arrived and took the bus driver to the Wheaton Franciscan Heart Hospital in Wauwatosa while police and bystanders stayed with the children aboard the bus.

“We just kind of tried to entertain them until someone showed up to drive the bus,” Collins said.

A relative of the victim, who has not been identified due to health privacy laws, last reported that he was still recovering in a hospital, Gage said.

“In the end, that’s all that really matters,” Collins said.

A former curator of the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth was reported in fair condition Monday evening after he was discovered with no pulse following a bizarre car crash Monday morning.

View First Aid Corps World Map of AED Locations in a larger map

Dental workers revived Ron Tyler after his car smashed into their office at 4901 Bryant Irvin Boulevard.

Julie Watson the Saviour

“I would have been sitting there. Right there,” said dental hygienist Jessica Weyman, pointing to the front of a car resting on the examination chair in her office. “A few more minutes, there would have been a patient in that chair.”

It was about 8 a.m. when the car rocketed into the dental office of Dr. Gary Pointer.

“Looking out the front door, [I] saw trees, bricks and a car go flying by the front door,” said dance instructor Debbi Jo Utter.

The car went airborne just a step or two from Utter’s dance studio nearby.

“I’m sure the tree, the fence and the pole slowed him down,” said Utter. “He was going fast.”

Office workers rushed to the lifeless driver.

“[I] went back inside and got some gloves,” said dental hygienist Julie Watson. “Came back out and noticed he was unresponsive; had no pulse.”

Watson yelled for someone to bring the automated external defibrillator, or AED.

“[I] put the patches on him and shocked him and started CPR,” Watson said. “Luckily there was an MD at the end of the building, in another office. He came down and took over chest compressions for us.”

“Doing that CPR, you could see the color come back,” Weyman said. “It was pretty amazing.”

It took a number of “pretty amazing” coincidences to avoid any loss of life in the accident.

“This could have been a disaster,” Utter said. “We have 1,500 kids a week coming through this building.”

There were no kids at the dance studio; no one was in the dentist’s chair; and a building full of people equipped to save the driver’s life were right there.

And then there was this bit of luck:

“I’m usually not good under pressure, but luckily I held it together today… and fell apart afterward,” Watson said.

The intersection of Old Hickory Boulevard and Rio Vista Drive has a way of bringing back memories.

“We had just got over the bridge. We had been to get some gas,” said Peggy Poss who was stopped at the light in late May, with her husband Ben behind the wheel. “I looked around at him and he was like this leaning over. I was scared. I knew something was wrong.”

Ben Poss the Survivor

Ben was having sudden cardiac arrest.

“I don’t remember even stopping at the red light,” he said.

Luckily for Poss of all the places to have a heart attack that was probably the best, but it has nothing to do with the intersection, but the people in the cars around him.

NES employees Alan Nelson and Kurt Hellmann were in a truck right next to them that was also carrying an automated external defibrillator (AED). Nelson pulled Poss from the car and administered CPR before Hellmann used the AED to shock Poss back to life, according to spokesman Tim Hill.

“They had him on the ground working with him you know. I was just tore all to pieces,” Peggy Poss said.

The company decided to put defibrillators on 150 of their trucks last spring.

“Mainly we did it for safety concerns for our employees because we are working around high voltage,” said Hill.

They also knew the devices could help the public.

“It makes me feel mighty grateful,” said Ben Poss. “From what I’ve been told I wouldn’t be here today if it hadn’t been for them.”

For Poss, it means a lot more than a second chance. It also means the company he worked at for nearly 35 years came to his rescue.

“It was just ironic that we ended up using it to save the life of a former NES employee,” Hill said.

It’s why, for them, the intersection will never be the same.

“Every time I think about where he was laying, right there in the grass,” Peggy Poss said.

Poss said one day he hopes to meet with the NES crew as well as a Vanderbilt heart specialist who just happened to be there.