Concordville Fire Co. EMS honored 10 people Thursday night for saving the life of a man who went into cardiac arrest while shopping at Target. According to Concordville EMS Capt. Joe O’Leary, the incident happened on July 15.
During the award presentation, O’Leary said the patient went into sudden cardia arrest and was unresponsive. Store personnel and an off-duty nurse who was at the store checkout line went into action immediately but were having no success in resuscitating the man. EMTs showed up and were able to bring him back to consciousness in about 15 minutes and within another five minutes, he was awake and talking and his vital signs were back to normal.
“Suddden cardiac arrest is when a person’s heart is unable to beat effectively or not at all, resulting in a loss of pulse and respiratory drive,” O’Leary explained. “Despite the hard work of provider teams, many patients either expire at the scene or later at the hospital. In the United States, the national average of those who are successfully resuscitated from sudden cardiac arrest is approximately 30 percent. Those who are successfully resuscitated and return to a normal quality of life are less than 10 percent.”
The Target shopper is in that 10 percent. He was transferred to Riddle Memorial Hospital where he went through successful cardiac catheterization and had an internal defibrillator installed.
“If it wasn’t for the efforts of everybody involved from start to finish [the other customer, store staff, Delaware County Emergency Services and the EMS teams from Concordville Fire Co.] that gentleman would probably not still be with us,” O’Leary said.
The people honored are Brett Osborne, Nico Matonti, and Jackson Tracey from Target, Dan Harold and Josh Going from Delaware County Department of Emergency Services, Carlie Fiorentini from Crozer EMS, Tom Nauss, John Poole, Jay Mueller, and Steve Syska from Concordville, and nurse Katie Crawford who happened to be in the same checkout line when the patient collapsed.
About Rich Schwartzman
Rich Schwartzman has been reporting on events in the greater Chadds Ford area since September 2001 when he became the founding editor of The Chadds Ford Post. In April 2009 he became managing editor of ChaddsFordLive. He is also an award-winning photographer.
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