First Aid Corps

Alan Barney was able to sit up over a plate of spaghetti in his Saint Mary’s Hospital room Tuesday, hoping to spend Thanksgiving at home with his two sons, thanks to three employees at Reno Concrete Inc.

Barney, 58, a technician with the city of Reno’s public works department since 1999, was cutting roots for a project off of Robb Drive last week while the contractors with the concrete company were working nearby.

“Alan was bent down, he was sawing on a root and told our guys that ‘I’m getting too old for this,’” said Mike Popejoy, the owner of Reno Concrete, on Tuesday. “Then, he just passed out and fell backward.”

That’s when Raul Castillo, Bill Nagel and Jose Garcia started CPR and got one of the defibrillators stashed away in one of their work trucks. First responders arrived about a minute later, Popejoy said.

“I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for them,” Barney said from his hospital room. “Their guys showed up and saved my cookies.”

It wasn’t the first time Reno Concrete had faced a life-threatening situation. One of their employees suffered a heart attack three years ago, resulting in the company buying the defibrillators and training everyone how to use them, Popejoy said.

“You don’t think you’re ever going to use it,” he said. “But it was sure nice to have.”

After the heart attack, Barney woke up a couple of days later with tubes running into his body while his two sons, Justin, 18, and Ryan, 21, stayed by his side.

Barney had triple bypass surgery Saturday but was hoping to leave the hospital by Wednesday. And while he’s not sure about Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday, his sons said they’ll likely delay their holiday dinner by a couple weeks to let their father recuperate.

Barney said he’s now thinking about retirement after nearly 33 years of public service, including jobs in Lassen County, Calif., and with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

And as families sit down around table to say what they’re thankful for this week, Justin Barney said that’s an easy question to answer: The men and the machine that helped save his father’s life.

“I think Reno should increase more of the defibrillators in the contractor trucks,” he said. “Because if it wasn’t there, he wouldn’t be here right now.”

The young man lay on the ground, his body having just received a jolt of 13,800 volts of electricity from a power line.

Craig Nedell, Robert Mancinelli & Jerry Wainio the Saviours

He had no pulse.

He was lifeless.

Angel Caguana, 23, of Brockton and another roofer had been struck by an electrical current when a ladder they were moving off a house in Bridgewater fell back and came in contact with nearby utility wires.

Fire Lt. Robert Mancinelli, who was among the first emergency crews to arrive on the scene, said Caguana had no pulse.

“I’ve never had anything this serious,” Mancinelli, a 24-year fire veteran, recalled later.

Mancinelli, 47, and firefighters Jerry Wainio, 32, and Craig Nedell, 46, worked on Caguana with a defibrillator, which gives a therapeutic dose of electrical energy to the heart to start it beating again.

As bystanders watched, the rescue workers shocked Caguana once with the defibrillator and administered CPR for about five minutes before they finally got a pulse, fire officials said. All three are paramedics.

Wainio said he has worked on “a lot of people” and “most don’t come back (with a pulse).”

Caguana “was really young and that’s a huge contributing factor. He actually left here with a pulse and breathing on his own,” Wainio said.

Caguana, still unconscious, was picked up by a medical helicopter at the St. Thomas Aquinas Church parking lot on Center Street and flown to Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston with serious injuries.

The hospital could not provide a condition for him on Wednesday. The Fire Department said Wednesday evening that he is in serious condition, but would probably not sustain any permanent neurological damage. However, he did suffer some severe burns, according to the Fire Department.

A local company honored some of its employees on Friday for their efforts in saving a co-worker’s life.

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Back in May, one of the employees at ECR International suffered a heart attack in the Customer Service Department. A signal code red alerted other employees in the building who are trained as first responders and the employee’s pulse was restored with an automated external defibrillator.

Director of Human Resources Johnita DeMatteo says the incident was life changing for all involved.

“I was really very concerned about the employee, hoping that he was going to be okay,” DeMatteo said. “I just did what I had to do. I really didn’t think about it. Your adrenaline kicks in and you just do what you have to do.”

A contractor doing electrical work at the Lawrence Township Department of Public Works facility was electrocuted this afternoon (Friday, July 8), but coworkers, township police officers and emergency medical personnel teamed up to restart the man’s heart and restore his breathing, township police department spokesman Lt. Charles Edgar confirmed.

The contractor, 24-year-old Zaed Quituqa of Haledon, was listed in critical condition at Capital Health Regional Medical Center in Trenton this evening, he said.

Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) initiated by Quituqa’s coworkers and continued by Officer Shawn Carroll and Sgt. Michael Yeh, along with the use by the police officers of an automated external defibrillator (AED), was credited with saving Quituqa’s life, Edgar said.

Standing on the elevated platform of a scissor-type lift, Quituqa and a coworker from I & T Electrical Lighting of Paterson were working on overhead lights in the public works garage in the 200 block Bakers Basin Road when the accident happened about 3:15 p.m., Edgar said.

Police are still investigating exactly what happened, he said, but somehow Quituqa came in contact with electricity.

When his coworker realized Quituqa was being shocked, the coworker used his foot to kick Quituqa clear of the lighting and anything else he might have been touching, such as the metal rails for one of the garage’s overhead doors, according to Edgar. The coworker was not hurt, he said.

The coworker quickly lowered the lift and he and others moved Quituqa from the lift to the floor. He was not breathing and had no pulse at that time, Edgar said.

While a public works employee dialed 911 to request assistance, he said, Quituqa’s coworkers started CPR.

Carroll and Yeh soon arrived. Confirming that Quituqa was in cardiac arrest, they connected a defibrillator to Quituqa and delivered an electrical pulse to his body in the hope the targeted shock would jumpstart his heart into beating correctly again, Edgar said. After the delivering the shock, Carroll and Yeh resumed CPR.

After about two minutes of them performing CPR, Quituqa’s heart began beating again and he started to breathe, he said.

Lawrence Township Emergency Medical Service personnel and paramedics from Capital Health System then arrived to take over patient care. They quickly bundled Quituqa into an ambulance and rushed him to the hospital in Trenton.

Russell Morrison barely remembers the day his heart stopped four times but he will always remember the technology and people involved in saving his life.

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The Invercargill Licensing Trust recently granted more than $4000 to buy its 57th defibrillator for the region – Mr Morrison’s life was saved by one of the first.

Russell Morrison the Survivor

In early 2008 the defibrillator was donated to the Georgetown Bowling Club. Three weeks later Mr Morrison, then 65 and working as the club’s greenkeeper, collapsed.

He was preparing the green for an upcoming tournament when he stopped breathing, he said yesterday.

“I was told that the mower took off, ending up in a ditch, and I landed on the green.”

Two first-year bowlers assisted. One started CPR while the other rushed for his cellphone to call an ambulance.

Another club member and trained defibrillator operator who happened to be driving past was flagged down and he began attempting to restart Mr Morrison’s heart.

“I’m told I leapt 75mm off the ground,” he said.

The ambulance quickly arrived, paramedics took over and he was resuscitated another three times.

He was taken to Southland Hospital and his daughter Pam Wilson and her two brothers were told the news was grim.

“I got a call to say Dad had collapsed and it wasn’t looking good. I was told there was no hope. I didn’t think he would survive,” Mrs Wilson said yesterday.

Mr Morrison was incoherent and does not remember the next few days.

“There was not much that could be done for me and virtually, I was in a room to die.”

But the defibrillator proved its worth and left doctors in awe of Mr Morrison’s recovery.

He was taken through to Dunedin for an angiogram and it was found a blood clot was the cause. He also had 90 per cent of three parts of his arteries blocked.

Mr Morrison said he appreciated everyone’s contribution and the defibrillator.

“When I look back I have enjoyed the past few years and look forward to many more. The defibrillator saved my life.”