Quote:
Originally Posted by memason
Pooh... Could you explain a little about the logistics of the AED.
- Where are they kept?
- Are they accessible 24/7?
- Is training available and do all residents get trained?
- Approximate cost/AED
Sounds like a good idea to have in the neighborhood!
Thanks for the post! |
We have two on our street, Mike. Both are attached to the exterior of homes....one is in a locked case attached to the side of my garage, the other is down the street, in another locked case attached to the garage of another house. People have volunteered to be responders, they have the keys to the cases, and those individuals took CPR courses and learned how to use the AEDs. Actually, the AEDs tell you exactly what to do with written instructions and voice prompts. Initially we had pagers to alert us to the need to get a move on to a cardiac arrest event on our street....once 911 is called and informed of a cardiac arrest, our pagers would go off telling where to head out to. We have since switched to an automated telephone response system. The fee is a little higher, but more accurate. Pagers were plagued with low battery problems and invalid alerts.
We had our training at the fire department, Capt. Lazenby was our instructor. You can contact him for any information you might need concerning the AED's.
Since the devices are located on the exterior of homes, they are accessible at any time. The cost, at the time we purchased, was approximately $50 to $60/household. The devices might be a bit more expensive now and you do have to pay for whatever paging system you use. We currently pay less than $15/household /year for our alert system. Figures are all approximate....I don't do the billing, one of our dear neighbors does and we haven't received our bill for this year.
One thing that was sort of funny....a few years ago, our pagers went off, alerting us to a cardiac problem at an elderly neighbor's house. Mike and I grabbed the AED, got in the golf cart and headed down the street. A total of 11 responders showed up. One of our responders knocked on the door.....no answer....she knocked once again....no answer. The men were just about ready to push open or break down the door when it slowly opened. There was our dear, elderly neighbor. Poor thing. She looked more frightened than ill...
11 people with two AEDs standing at her front door. Thought she was going to need it! The pager system had issued a test, though the word test never did show up initially....and an address....so good neighbors that we all are, off we went to try and help someone in need.
(One of the reasons, this false alert, that helped sway us to a different company for paging.)
Every once in a while, the fire department will issue a test run....they place a dummy outside of someone's house, issue an alert and then watch to see how many respond, how well they perform. Our last one was on a very hot mid morning....but there was a good response and we got a good review from Capt. Lazenby.