Bowen first aid teacher Amanda Ockeloen is introducing a new app to Island first aid attendants that could save someone’s life.
PulsePoint alerts by-standers, who download the free app and are trained in hands-only CPR, if there is a victim of a sudden cardiac arrest within 1,300 feet of someone’s location anywhere in B.C.
Ockeloen, who’s been teaching first aid for more than 20 years, says this app could make Bowen residents feel safer because “there’s numbers of people that could step in to assist, so you wouldn’t be left on your own not knowing what to do.”
Anytime someone dials 911 the operator will decide if an automated external defibrillator (AED) is needed, the alert will be sent out, and the operator will send the coordinates to the first aid attendant responding to the notification.
Since all AEDs on Bowen are registered through the Public Access to Defibrillation Program run by the Heart and Stroke Foundation, the operators know each AED location.
“Everyone’s very excited about it,” Ockeloen said. “A lot of people felt like if they were home alone ‘how would they get the AED?’ You wouldn’t be able to stop CPR to go run and get it, now with this people will be alerted.”
The AEDs are user-friendly, displaying step-by-step instructions on the screen for any bystander to help a victim, but Ockeloen says its “irresponsible” not to take a first-aid class because it’s easy and should be common sense.
AEDs should only be used on a cardiac arrest and not a heart attack, so knowing the difference is important.
Ockeloen says there’s already been a couple of incidents when an AED had to be used on Bowen: a few residents who had a cardiac arrest at home and one who had one by the dock.
There’s a total of 16 AEDs on the island and Ockeloen says they’ve gotten the “go-ahead” to station more.
Tunstall Bay, Eagle Cliff and the Legion area are only some of the locations they’re hoping to add.
Every second counts during cardiac arrest. By immediately using an AED on the victim, it can increase the chance of survival by 75 per cent or more when combined with CPR.
“I’m about a 10-minute drive from the ferry, where the ambulance station is. So there’s no chance, right? It wouldn’t work. So you need to have (AEDs) around the island.”
Residents can check the AED locations on the municipality's website.
