Centre gets to the heart of the matter.THE Abbeygate shopping centre has become the first retail complex in Warwickshire to install a life-saving defibrillator defibrillator, device that delivers an electrical shock to the heart in order to stop certain forms of rapid heart rhythm disturbances (arrhythmias). The shock changes a fibrillation to an organized rhythm or changes a very rapid and ineffective cardiac rhythm to a . The centre was given a new machine as part of a scheme organised by West Midlands Ambulance Service The West Midlands Ambulance Service NHS Trust is the authority responsible for providing NHS ambulance services in Herefordshire, Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin, Warwickshire, West Midlands, and Worcestershire in the West Midlands region. , and shopping centre staff have been given training on how to use the equipment. Designed to be used following a heart attack, defibrillators stabilise a patient's heartbeat and can be operated by anyone who has undergone a short training session. Nicola Cormell, Abbeygate centre manager, said: "We want to look after all of our visitors and centre staff as much as possible, and thanks to this scheme, our security staff are better equipped to help someone in an emergency." Keith Bromwich, from the West Midlands Ambulance Service, said: "Around 75,000 people die from a cardiac arrest each year before they get to hospital. The sooner we can defibrillate de·fib·ril·late tr.v. de·fib·ril·lat·ed, de·fib·ril·lat·ing, de·fib·ril·lates To stop the fibrillation of (a heart) and restore normal contractions through the use of drugs or an electric shock. somebody the greater the chance of survival. "By increasing the number of defibrillators in public places the percentage surviving can only increase." |
|
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion