A 13-year old male student attending James Keating Elementary School is alive today thanks to the partnership between the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Ontario and the County of Simcoe Paramedic Services.
The grade 8 student collapsed on one of the school's athletic fields. Staff from the school immediately called 9-1-1 and began CPR and called for the AED. The Southern Georgian Bay OPP arrived on the scene. The officer fully utilized the AED to shock the young student's heart which had stopped beating. Following a brief period of further CPR he began to show signs of circulation. The County of Simcoe Paramedic Services arrived within the next few minutes and confirmed that the 13-year old had a pulse.
The placement of the AED at the James Keating Elementary School was directed by the County of Simcoe Paramedic Services Public Access Defibrillation Program and made possible by the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Ontario's Heart&Stroke Restart a Heart, a Life Program and the Chase McEachern Tribute Fund. This AED was put in place on March 4, 2008.
"Over the past three years we have received generous donations to our Heart&Stroke Restart a Heart, a Life Program and the Chase McEachern Tribute Fund from individuals, community groups and our corporate sponsors. With these funds we have been able to allocate 2,795 AED units in communities across the province," says Marco Di Buono, Director of Research, Heart and Stroke Foundation of Ontario. "This life saved is a testament to what happens when individuals in the community learn CPR and when an AED is within reach.
According to the Heart and Stroke Foundation, up to 85 percent of cardiac arrests occur at home or in public places and almost half are witnessed by a family member or friend. In Ontario alone, approximately 7,000 out-of hospital sudden cardiac arrests occur annually. The survival rate of victims for an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest is a dismal five percent. However, CPR performed by a bystander while the emergency medical team is on its way quadruples a person's chance of being successfully resuscitated. Furthermore, defibrillation when used in conjunction with CPR in the first few minutes can dramatically improve cardiac arrest survival rates by more than 50 percent.