New defibrillator in Buckingham increases chance of survival following cardiac arrest

We are thrilled to announce that our Town Mayor, Anja Schaefer formally unveiled our latest installed community AED (Automatic External Defibrillator) at the SSE Overn Shop on Overn Avenue on Saturday 2nd August.

This particular AED, and the cabinet it is housed in, has been fully funded by the amazing generosity of Buckingham Table. We are very grateful for their support in improving community access to these important lifesaving devices.

Buckingham AED Project was set up in 2014 and since then we have installed, and continue to support, 23 AEDs in our local community. We take part in the Restart a Heart campaign annually at Tescos, and our committee members deliver defibrillator public awareness sessions throughout the year.

These sessions give bystanders the knowledge to identify the key signs of a person in Cardiac Arrest; to seek urgent help via the 999 call to the Ambulance Service, to start life-saving CPR and to identify the location/access code of their nearest defibrillator which gives them the confidence to use one in an emergency.

If this is something you would like more information on, please chat to one of us at the unveiling on Saturday. We are more than happy to help.

A bit of info about AED’s and why they are important.

New research from the British Heart Foundation and The Circuit recently revealed the shocking fact that the less affluent an area is, the further it is likely to be from a 24/7 accessible defibrillator.

They have mapped the walking distance from every registered defibrillator in the UK and found on average one is 19 minutes away. This means for many postcodes across the UK the 24/7 available defibrillators are roughly half a mile away.

While this is a huge improvement from when the AED Project started, we still think this is too far - a few minutes delay can make the difference between life and death. The Buckingham AED Project was set up to ensure that everyone in our community, no matter where they live, has access to a defibrillator and understands that they are easy to use. No specialist training is required.

More than 30,000* cardiac arrests in a public place or private residence occur each year in the UK – on average that’s 200 a day!

8 out of 10* cardiac arrests occur in the home or a workplace and half are witnessed by a bystander, typically this means that you are more likely to be helping someone you know when they are in need of an AED.

(Stats according to Resuscitation Council UK)*

Fewer than 1 in 10 people survive an out of hospital cardiac arrest.

Around 7-8% of people survive to hospital discharge, where resuscitation is attempted

*Immediate initiation of CPR can double or quadruple survival rates from Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest.

Defibrillation within 3 – 5 minutes of collapse can increase survival rates up to 50-70%.

Each minute of delay reduces the probability of survival to hospital discharge by 10%

Fewer than 6% of people have an automated external defibrillator (AED) deployed in the critical minutes before the Ambulance arrives.*

*[Resuscitation Council 9UK).,m 2015a; BHF, 2017]

What does the AED do?

It assesses the heart rhythm of the person and, if needed, provides a short electrical shock to jolt the heart back into its normal pumping rhythm. The AED can be used by anyone as a voice prompt tells the user exactly what to do.

You cannot injure the patient when using a defibrillator.

So far in the last 12 months defibrillators in our area have been deployed on 3 different occasions.

What are the symptoms of a cardiac arrest?

A cardiac arrest is an emergency that usually happens without warning. If someone is in cardiac arrest, they collapse suddenly and:

-will be unconscious

-will be unresponsive, and

-not breathing or not breathing normally – this may mean they’re making gasping noises.

Without immediate treatment, the person will die.

If you see someone having a cardiac arrest, phone 999 immediately and start CPR.