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Newsroom
Houston Chronicle
August 18, 2008
James Gee, like other Houston Airport Security personnel, sat through emergency training last year with hopes that he wouldn't have to use the skill.
That all changed June 6 when Gee and two colleagues took action to help a co-worker who collapsed at Bush Intercontinental Airport.
Gee used his CPR skills and also the department's newly acquired automatic external defibrillator until paramedics arrived to tend to his 33-year-old co-worker.
Gee, along with officials from the American Red Cross, The Methodist Hospital System, the Texas Arrhythmia Institute and the Houston Texans, announced plans Monday to train 1,000 people on using AEDs and performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation on Sept. 27. The mass training will take place at the Houston Texans training facility.
"It is our hope to increase awareness about cardiac deaths and encourage everyone to learn how to save a life," said Dr. Valentina Ugolini with the Texas Arrhythmia Institute.
AEDs are becoming more commonplace in businesses and schools, but Ugolini said it would be most effective if people actually knew how to use the devices. The use of CPR and AEDs have played a part in saving the lives of many people locally, including a 15-year-old Lamar High School football player.
Dr. Jeff Kalina, an emergency room physician at The Methodist Hospital, said he has had to deliver "horrible news" to family members, telling them their loved ones did not survive cardiac arrest.
But over the years, he said, the use of AEDs in conjunction with CPR has increased the rate of survival for cardiac arrest patients.
There are about 400,000 cardiac arrests each year in the country, and Kalina said, of those, the survival rate is less than 3 percent without intervention.
The survival rate for someone with cardiac arrest goes down 10 percent every minute. After 10 minutes, the chances of survival are minimal, Ugolini said. With the CPR and AED intervention, the survival rate is 75 percent.
Kalina said the use of CPR in conjunction with an AED could have helped numerous drowning victims in the Houston area this summer because the AEDs are fitted for pediatric use. He encouraged apartment complexes to have the AEDs on hand, especially around swimming pools.
For Gee and his co-workers, Miguel Cacho and Jennifer Carnes, the AED made the difference in helping save the life of their co-worker, Roshanda Passmore.
The group had gathered for a 6 a.m. briefing when Passmore collapsed in her chair.
"She had literally passed out," Gee said.
After getting Passmore on the floor, Carnes called for someone to get the AED that was located down the hall while Cacho positioned himself to do compressions.
The group followed the electronic instructions on the AED and shocked Passmore three times before paramedics arrived and rushed her to a hospital.
Gee said anyone is capable of using an AED but encouraged the training in order to be familiar with the device.
"You go through the training in hopes you don't ever have to use it," Gee said, "but thank God it was there."
Copyright © 2008 - Houston Chronicle
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