Every hour, 52 New Zealanders call 111 for an ambulance. This highlights the need for St John during their annual appeal week, from April 4-10. Karla and Scott McCormick share why they want to see St John raise money.
Karla McCormick woke up to her husband Scott 'making a noise” on Monday September 28, 2015, at 5.59am.
That unusual noise, it turns out, was Scott in cardiac arrest.
'I didn't know what was happening, I had no idea,” Karla says, when she found her fit and healthy 36-year-old husband in cardiac arrest that morning.
The couple had run a 12km run the day before, which Scott says he has no memory of.
'I can't remember from Sunday night, and then I can remember going over to the Waikato hospital on Tuesday. Half of the Sunday I can't remember,” says Scott.
Karla says the 111 call-taker made the initial CPR process easy and calming, explaining how to get Scott from the bed to the floor and counting with her as she performed CPR.
'She talked me through everything; e ven how to get him off the bed. I said he's a big guy and she said grab the sheet and pull it and it got him on the floor easy. I wouldn't have thought to do that,” says Karla.
'If it hadn't been for her I would never have thought to start CPR, even though I'd done a course years ago.”
The process of CPR helped keep Karla calm, she says, as it gave her 'something to do” while she waited for the four paramedics that saved Scott to arrive.
Intensive care paramedic Rob Burgess and paramedics Vivian Cessford, Andy Lowes and Allisa Marchant arrived at Karla and Scott's house in two ambulances.
'When we first came in, she was doing such a great job of CPR on him,” says Rob says, and Vivian says 'Karla was great”.
'Approximately five ‘out-of-hospital' cardiac arrests occur in New Zealand every day, and for every minute of cardiac arrest without CPR or defibrillation a patient's chance of survival falls by 10-15 per cent,” says Andy.
Allisa says she can't 'believe he's here” because of these survival rate statistics.
And with a response time of six minutes from the station in 17th Avenue to Waterside Avenue in Pyes Pa, Karla's CPR was 'instrumental” according to Vivian.
Rob says the takeover from CPR to defibrillation needs to be swift and smooth.
'We immediately come in, once we get things settled we take over the CPR, whip these [the defibrillator pads] off. One goes there [above and to the left of the heart], one goes here] below and to the right of the heart] and then we analyse the rhythm,” says Rob.
'If it's a shockable rhythm we immediately shock and it sends a big 200 joules of electricity through the heart, which shocks the heart into a standstill.”
But the process doesn't stop there. 'Once we do a quick shock, we then establish a rhythm. We had no return of rhythm we then stick IV's in him, give him some cardiac drugs, carry on with CPR, reassess the rhythm, give him another shock.
'Once we return rhythm, we stop the CPR, we stabilise the rhythm with other drugs if necessary, make sure he's got a good airway and breathing,” says Rob.
Thankfully for Scott, he re-established a normal heart rhythm 'quite quickly” says Vivian. 'We only did two shocks.”
'In our situation, Scott is now in a stable condition that we can then begin transport. We can't transport someone under CPR,” says Rob.
Scott was initially stabilised in Tauranga Hospital, then transferred to Waikato for 'continuing treatment and care,” says Andy.
Once the patient arrives at hospital and the ambulance staff has handed them over, that's usually it.
'We don't see much of the contact with patients once we get them to the hospital, it's not normally a thing I do,” says Rob, as a bit of a self-preservation thing.
The follow-up with this patient was a 'privilege” for Vivian, who says this was a first for her.
'I think all of us as individuals but also as teams we do our best to follow people up at the hospital,” says Vivian.
'But people move on, whether it's to other departments or the shift at the hospital changes over, we lose sight of the person, so it's actually not easy to track people, but I know that we all do try and follow up patients, but this is rare.”
The cardiac arrest hasn't slowed Scott down all that much.
'The first three months I couldn't go to the gym or anything like that,” says Scott, and he only received his driver's licence again after Easter.
'But he's pretty much allowed to do it all. Just be careful and know your limits,” says Karla.
The cause remains one of life's little mysteries.
The four paramedics make up two separate crews, and the two crews don't work together – Andy and Allisawere working the night shift from 7pm-7am, and Vivian and Rob were working the day shift from 6am-6pm.
'We were toward the end of our shift and Vivian and Rob had just started theirs,” says Andy.
'They were ready to go home well and truly and we were just coming on,” says Vivian.
Such a high-stress job can take its toll, though.
Andy says relaxing for him is 'about my dog and family, and good friends” and that support services and counselling are available if paramedics need them.
'And we talk,” says Vivien. 'We talk amongst ourselves after the job or during the job and you'll find that even if we hear of a job that's gone down somewhere else if you're close to that crew or whatever you'll come alongside them and say ‘Are you okay' after that job and everyone makes sure everyone has someone to talk to.
'Because the hours are long and if you do have a lot of them it can be hard. We talk it over with each other, because it's confidential so we can't really talk about it to outsiders,” she says.
Karla says she feels a lot of gratitude to St John. 'I'd do anything to help them now, they're amazing.
'It's such a cliché, you never think it's going to happen to you and then it does.”
And Scott's final words to the people that saved his life? 'Thanks for all your help, it could have been a different story, it could have gone either way really.”
St John is running their appeal week from April 4 and with a variety of events to raise funds, including bucket shakers in large shopping centres throughout the Western Bay of Plenty.
House of Travel Tauranga is hosting a movie night at Rialto Tauranga, screening ‘Hunt for the Wilderpeople' on Sunday, April 10 from 8pm.
Tickets cost $20, with free nibbles. Tickets can be purchased from House of Travel Tauranga or by emailing susieb@hot.co.nz
The St John OpShop in Glenlyon Ave, Greerton, will have a static display outlining the historical journey St John has taken in New Zealand along with videos showing various aspects of St John in the community and how ambulances are made.
To donate, visit www.stjohnappeal.org.nz, and to volunteer to help raise money, contact Andy at andyl@stjohn.co.nz