When you are faced with life and death situation, would it be helpful if you have some knowledge about AED management especially in the workplace?
AED stands for Automated External Defibrillator (AED) and its management means you know how to operate one in times of need or emergencies.
We all know how devastating it is to watch someone we know die of sudden cardiac arrest and we all know that this can occur without some sort of warning at all. However, it is more devastating to know that we could have prevented it from happening if: one, we are trained with CPR or we have access to AEDs and yet we don’t know how to manage it. Unfortunately, AED management is not something we talk on ordinary days – in fact only a few talks about it at all.
Some Facts
Sudden cardiac arrest – regardless of age – can be prevented if bystanders like you are:
- In the right frame of mind to call the local emergency hotline without any delay and be able to relay the information well so that the response team would have a slightest idea on what to expect on scene without panicking.
- Knowledgeable on doing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and performing it without any hesitation on the patient.
- Skilled on operating or managing an Automated External Defibrillator (AED).
These are by no means any joke – and it is not just like what you can watch in the TVs. In fact, it is not as fancy and as grandiose as those that you see on TV. Sometimes, when you are faced with the life and death situation your body seemed like in a trance or on autopilot.
However, this could have some drawbacks because sometimes even when you’re on autopilot – you are frozen as if your mind cannot take all that is happening around it. With a simple knowledge on AED management, you can actually save a lot of life and prevent the devastating effect of losing someone over a preventable cardiac arrest.
AEDs are those portable medical devices that are especially created to recognize and treat any potentially fatal dysfunctions in heart rhythm during the event of cardiac arrest. Just like what you see in TV shows or movies or in hospitals, these devices deliver electrical shock – which is termed as defibrillation – that can give your heart a kick start of functioning again and establish its normal heart beat, rate and rhythm.
Why are AEDs Necessary?
Basically, early defibrillation – just like CPR – is one of the critical steps when dealing with emergencies because it restores normal rhythm and rate of the heartbeat. This means that when the restoration is successful, the body can deliver the much needed oxygen to areas where it is needed. Also, a minute of delay would mean reducing the chance of the patient’s survival by 10%, which is a significant number considering the current trend.
Therefore, if you want to save lives or you live in workplaces where you can gain access to AEDs – it would be better if you obtain knowledge on how to operate it so as not to waste the usefulness of the device.
