Product category:
Personal protective equipment (PPE), devices
News Release from: Laerdal Medical | Subject: HeartStart FR2 defibrillators
Edited by the Manufacturingtalk Editorial
Team on 03 March 2005
Donation of defibrillators at Heathrow
Airport
London Ambulance Service to benefit from donation of defibrillators for its groundbreaking Cycle Response Unit at Heathrow Airport.
Laerdal Medical has donated three HeartStart FR2 defibrillators to the London Ambulance Service's Cycle Response Unit, based at Heathrow Airport The initiative is part of the Service's efforts to improve the survival rate for out-of-hospital cardiac arrests, which currently stands at 6.4 per cent in London
This article was originally published on Manufacturingtalk on 7 Dec 2005 at 8.00am (UK)
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The Cycle Response Unit, which began as a trial at Terminal 4 in October 2004, has responded to over 350 calls since its inception and plans are underway to extend the scheme to cover all four terminals.
Incidents at the airport can include up to six sudden cardiac arrests per week, more than in all combined underground and overground train stations in London.
With a daily average of 164,000 passengers passing through the airport, the volume of pedestrian and vehicle traffic can lead to severe congestion, slowing down ambulance response times.
In 80 per cent of sudden cardiac arrests, defibrillation is the only definitive treatment and the quicker it is administered, the more effective it is.
For every minute lost, the sufferer's chance of survival decreases by 10 per cent.
In order to reach medical emergencies as quickly as possible, a Cycle Response Unit is based at Terminal 4, with two bikes manned by five members of staff from 0530hrs until 1630hrs.
The bikes are equipped with blue lights and sirens, basic life support equipment, oxygen, pain-relieving gas and a defibrillator.
They are designed to attend major incidents quickly so that life-saving treatment can be started before the arrival of an ambulance.
They can also attend minor incidents, freeing up ambulances to attend to more patients in other locations.
Alan Payne, a duty station officer at Hillingdon Ambulance Station and manager of the bicycle ambulances at the Airport, explains, "Heathrow Airport, as a single location, has the highest number of reported cardiac arrests in the UK.
In the last seven days there have been seven cardiac arrests in Terminal 3 alone".
"As the bicycle ambulances are usually first on the scene of an incident, we are delighted that Laerdal has donated the HeartStart FR2s".
"They are reliable, compact, sturdy, can be used on adults and children and they are compatible with other London Ambulance Service emergency medical equipment".
"Most importantly, they have already saved people's lives at London Heathrow Airport.".
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