These devices save lives, but almost no one has them at home

On the evening of January 15, 2021, in a remote town in the Arizona desert, Christine Benton saved a life.
She and her husband, Brian Benton, were traveling across the country in an RV and had parked near other RVs in a basement in Willcox. While the couple were having dinner, someone started shouting from a motorhome. behind them. A woman had collapsed and was in cardiac arrest. She had no pulse. Frantically, her husband called 911 while two others began CPR.
"She looked like she was gone," Ms. Benton said. , a retired paramedic firefighter.
But Ms. Benton had made a big decision before she and her husband started: she had purchased a personal automated external defibrillator, or A.E.D., which can shock a living person's heart if it suddenly stops beating. Her plan was to keep him with her, just in case. It was expensive, she was very unlikely to ever use it, and her husband was hesitant. But she was adamant.
"If I ever found myself in a situation where I could save a life and I didn't have an AED, I could never live with myself,” she told her husband at the time.
As a firefighter, Ms Benton had been trained to use a defibrillator She knew that if someone's heart stopped, a rescuer should immediately begin CPR, pushing hard and rhythmically on the chest, while another rescuer would go get an A.E.D. , A.E.D. should be used.
And Ms. Benton knew AEDs were easy to use, even for someone untrained. The device speaks to rescuers and tells them how to do it.
But even though all states have laws requiring A.E.D.s to be available in public places, Ms. Benton worried that if someone had a cardiac arrest in a location where the nearest A.E.D. was miles away, the person could die - minutes count when it comes to resuscitating someone in cardiac arrest. For every one minute delay in resuscitation, the probability of survival decreases by up to 10%.
For Ms. Benton, the decision to purchase an AED. made perfect sense. I also ordered one for myself after reporting on football player Damar Hamlin's on-field cardiac arrest. When it arrives, I'll tell my neighborhood Google group that I have it.
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Health Apr 11, 2023 0 47 Add to Reading List

These devices save lives, but almost no one has them at home

On the evening of January 15, 2021, in a remote town in the Arizona desert, Christine Benton saved a life.

She and her husband, Brian Benton, were traveling across the country in an RV and had parked near other RVs in a basement in Willcox. While the couple were having dinner, someone started shouting from a motorhome. behind them. A woman had collapsed and was in cardiac arrest. She had no pulse. Frantically, her husband called 911 while two others began CPR.

"She looked like she was gone," Ms. Benton said. , a retired paramedic firefighter.

But Ms. Benton had made a big decision before she and her husband started: she had purchased a personal automated external defibrillator, or A.E.D., which can shock a living person's heart if it suddenly stops beating. Her plan was to keep him with her, just in case. It was expensive, she was very unlikely to ever use it, and her husband was hesitant. But she was adamant.

"If I ever found myself in a situation where I could save a life and I didn't have an AED, I could never live with myself,” she told her husband at the time.

As a firefighter, Ms Benton had been trained to use a defibrillator She knew that if someone's heart stopped, a rescuer should immediately begin CPR, pushing hard and rhythmically on the chest, while another rescuer would go get an A.E.D. , A.E.D. should be used.

And Ms. Benton knew AEDs were easy to use, even for someone untrained. The device speaks to rescuers and tells them how to do it.

But even though all states have laws requiring A.E.D.s to be available in public places, Ms. Benton worried that if someone had a cardiac arrest in a location where the nearest A.E.D. was miles away, the person could die - minutes count when it comes to resuscitating someone in cardiac arrest. For every one minute delay in resuscitation, the probability of survival decreases by up to 10%.

For Ms. Benton, the decision to purchase an AED. made perfect sense. I also ordered one for myself after reporting on football player Damar Hamlin's on-field cardiac arrest. When it arrives, I'll tell my neighborhood Google group that I have it.

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