By Doug Hoagland
Fresno Bee
Copyright 2007 McClatchy Newspapers, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
FRESNO, Calif. — A Fresno State football fan suffering a heart attack slumped to his bleacher seat one evening last September as the last notes of the national anthem floated through Bulldog Stadium.
Douglas Phariss of Fresno, then 46, stopped breathing, and his body turned blue.
“He was basically dead,” said Clovis nurse Claudia Sanders, a fan who administered CPR before emergency workers arrived.
A paramedic crew shocked Phariss with a defibrillator -- a medical device that delivers an electrical jolt to an irregularly beating heart in an attempt to restore normal rhythm.
This year, stadium workers will be better prepared for such emergencies. Starting Saturday, two Fresno State traffic officers will be carrying defibrillators while on foot inside Bulldog Stadium during games.
Sudden cardiac arrest is reportedly rare at the stadium. Even so, the officers will be armed with the smaller-sized defibrillators that are becoming more common in public places to treat emergencies, when minutes can separate life from death.
Authorities say the devices are easy to operate and save lives. But one fan who helped Phariss says the new defibrillators won’t do any good if emergency personnel don’t respond quickly
Several people who were at the stadium say as many as 20 minutes elapsed after Phariss collapsed before emergency workers arrived. University officials dispute that, saying police and paramedics got to Phariss within five minutes.
Phariss has declined to be drawn into the controversy, but says he was glad to survive: “I feel really blessed. It’s a miracle I’m here.”
Fresno State’s officers will carry the 4-pound defibrillators, which are smaller versions of the devices used by many paramedics.
The University Police Department started talking about using them two years ago, but the idea took on new urgency after Phariss suffered cardiac arrest at the Fresno State-Colorado State game on Sept. 30, 2006.
“We thought we could have made a difference if we could have responded with something,” University Police Chief David Huerta said. “Fortunately, everything did work out.”
The department bought five defibrillators for $8,975 and will train patrol officers, who could carry them every day on campus, Huerta said.
University Police -- assisted by Fresno Police -- keep order inside Bulldog Stadium during games. But medical care is provided by paramedic crews from American Ambulance.
Two paramedic crews -- each with an ambulance -- park at the stadium, and a supervisor who can provide advanced life support also is on duty, said American Ambulance supervisor Russ Richardson. The crews have one, and sometimes two, golf carts to move around the grounds.
In nine years of supervising crews at Bulldog Stadium, Richardson said Phariss’ cardiac arrest is the only such case he can recall -- something Fresno State’s computer records couldn’t confirm because they don’t include details of medical calls. Still, American Ambulance supports Fresno State’s decision to equip its officers.
“If you’re the one patient who has cardiac arrest in the stadium, would you want them to have a defibrillator or not?” Richardson asked.
Nationally, some stadiums are expanding medical coverage by training facility personnel to use the smaller defibrillators, said Daniel Connaughton, an associate professor of sports management at the University of Florida.
Following suit are many police departments, whose officers often beat medical crews to emergency scenes, said Connaughton. Many airports and shopping malls also have the devices on hand. “I’m not going to say these defibrillators are idiot proof, but for someone who is trained they are easy to operate,” Connaughton said.
The devices give voice instructions and will not shock a patient unless the device detects that it’s necessary, using data from electrodes attached to the body, said nurse-manager Elaine Long at The Heart Institute at Community Regional Medical Center.
“To me, the biggest danger is not having one when you need one,” Long said.
Patients must have no pulse and not be breathing for the defibrillator to be used, said Daniel Lynch, director of emergency medical services for the county Department of Community Health, which is overseeing Fresno State’s use of the devices.
He said Fresno State is serving the public by getting them.
“The more we can get trained individuals out there with this kind of equipment and skill level, the greater chances we have of saving lives,” Lynch said.
The American Heart Association says quick use of the defibrillators saves more lives. Survival rates “are drastically increased” when the devices are used within three to five minutes of a sudden cardiac arrest. For every minute the heart goes without a shock, the chance of survival decreases 7% to 10%, according to the association’s Web site.
Survival statistics weren’t on Phariss’ mind when he went to the Sept. 30 game. “I stopped in the bathroom before the game and a week later I woke up in the hospital,” he said.
When Phariss collapsed shortly before the start of the game, some fans sprang into action. Larry Kaprielian, an inventory manager from Kingsburg, did mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Donna Blair -- a Fresno dentist who was so disturbed by the paramedics’ response time that she later asked for a meeting with Fresno State officials -- told a stadium security employee in a yellow jacket to call for medical help.
“It seemed forever and ever and ever, and finally the paramedics came,” Blair said. “It was a really long time.”
Blair and Kaprielian both said it took the paramedics about 20 minutes to reach Phariss after he collapsed in the northwest section of the stadium. Sanders, the Clovis nurse, said she couldn’t estimate how long it took because she was focused on caring for Phariss. “I was glad I was there to help,” she said.
University Police got the call to help Phariss at 6:58 p.m., and less than a minute later, two University Police officers were on the scene. Paramedics arrived in five minutes, David Moll, director of public safety at Fresno State, said in an e-mail.
Blair said equipping Fresno State police officers with defibrillators is a good idea, but she wonders whether officers will be dispatched quickly enough.
“I think the most critical thing is having better communication so they can get first responders to scenes faster,” Blair said.
But a Fresno State official said that’s already happening.
“I believe our system works,” said Paul Ladwig, an associate athletic director who helps oversee stadium operations.
Phariss’ wife, Claudette, said it’s hard to know whether mistakes were made, though she added: “Based upon the information I received from many people who were there that night, it appears it took an exorbitant amount of time to get professional help.”
Meanwhile, Doug Phariss will be back in his bleacher seat Saturday for Fresno State’s game against Sacramento State. He even attended a couple of games at the end of the 2006 season -- after he got out of the hospital.
Said Phariss: “It’s something I enjoy going to. I don’t think I’ll feel nervous.”