By SUSANNE NADEAU
Grand Forks Herald (North Dakota)
The Greater Grand Forks area has better “shock” options today, as emergency responder agencies Wednesday got a gift of automated external defibrillators.
AEDs are the little devices popping up in schools and courthouses identified by a lightning-struck red heart. They defibrillate, or shock, a heart back into working when it’s stopped.
The 8-pound devices are instrumental when attempting to restore a regular rhythm after cardiac arrest, according to Holly Scott, the community health educator and AED coordinator for Fargo Cass Public Health, who presented 34 of the defibrillators to local agencies.
“In case of a sudden cardiac arrest, these deliver a life-saving shock that restores the rhythm of the heart,” she said. It’s important for emergency responders to have defibrillators on hand to deliver that shock as soon as possible, she said.
Area emergency responder agencies got their defibrillators Wednesday in part through a grant from Dakota Medical Foundation of Fargo, which features an AED health initiative.
On average a defibrillator costs about $2000, Scott said.
The local agencies agree that getting additional defibrillators is a help to their departments and to the community.
Because of the award, the Grand Forks Police Department now has the ability to equip each squad car on the streets in any given shift with one of the devices.
“Up until now, someone was assigned a defib., and that could mean that an officer who wasn’t assigned the AED would respond to a situation that it was needed in. It could take a bit longer to get it there,” said Grand Forks Lt. Jim Remer. “Now, everybody responding will have one.”
Some defibrillators are already at fixed locations, such as the police department, he added.
The Grand Forks Police Department was awarded eight defibrillators Wednesday; it already had seven. The Grand Forks Fire Department received five.
The Grand Forks County Sheriff’s Department received nine defibrillators. The UND Police Department received three.
East Grand Forks Fire Department and Police Department each received two.
Fire departments in Gilby, Thompson, Emerado and Reynolds, N.D., also received defibrillators Wednesday. Reynolds got two of them.
Fourteen lives have been saved because of defibrillators, Scott said, since the Dakota Medical Foundation started its AED health initiative in 2001.