AED Training
Damn it! I must be getting jaded or something. We just heard over the loudspeakers at the DoD site where I work that there was a medical emergency and that an AED was needed in room H5.
No one in my office moved – and I turned to one of the guys next to me and asked him, “Where is room H5?” “Where is the nearest AED?”
By the time we got out the door several other people had responded. Then a call came out for a request for another AED. This time I left and a man told me they had several and that there were more people responding. Good enough for now – I wouldn’t be needed. I hope whoever it is will be alright.
This got me to thinking – why is it that in my office of probably 15 people I’m the only one that knows how to use an AED? The device is so completely simple that a ten-year old could operate it if they had to. Why didn’t I know where the AED was? Why wasn’t the emergency call prefixed by a warning sound so that it got our attention? Why haven’t we all been briefed on policies like this? I work in a government facility for god-sakes.
It occurs to me just now that we’ve not had a fire drill in a very long time and I have no idea what to do in case a fire-alarm is pulled.
Then I started thinking about my friends and family and their ability to respond to emergencies. How many of them are AED / CPR trained? Those that are in nursing and one of my sisters. My friend David is likely trained and certified as well – but he’s in the Army and has had some combat lifesaving experience, I think. Maybe he’ll chime in?
Why aren’t more people trained in CPR/AED? What can I do to change this? Why aren’t there very clear policies about what to do where I work currently and is this a common case? If there are policies, why are they not distributed to us in a meaningful manner?
In a large place it might be worthwhile to create a rapid response team – perhaps twenty percent of the staff that is expected to respond to any call for aide. This does two things – prevents too many people from showing up and crowding around the patient and it guarantees us that someone around us will know where the AED is and how to use it and CPR.
What am I going to do about this?
There are 6.3 billion people in the world…and growing. The earth can only feed roughly 9 billion, and the energy needs of 9 billion people coupled with the “improved” standard of living requiring more food and energy means that policy in government buildings starting in 2009 will be to swap AEDs for IEDs. This should help to aleviate some of the social security and pension issues as well, not to mention crowding at the watercooler. Soon you will be enjoying those calls for assistance as you frag the guy who always heats fish up in the microwave or leaves the coffee pot a dirty empty mess. My suggestion to use the carcasses as feedstock for swine has met resistance due to some religious/culteral clashes, but I think those can be overcome with time, if you catch my drift.
Well, as long as the policy is AEDs for IEDs and not IUDs. I, for one, wouldn’t want to learn how to apply those. Yikes.
[...] few days ago I realized I needed to do something about the lack of CPR and AED training at work. As I’m not going to be in this position very long (last day is May 9th) I don’t have a [...]