By Dylan Goetz
mlive.com
FLINT, Mich. — When racers flagged down a golf cart carrying three Flint-area residents at the Crim Festival of Races, they didn’t realize it wasn’t an official medical vehicle.
As luck would have it, all three passengers had medical experience — even though they were only there to take photos.
Unexpectedly, they became lifesavers.
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What happened next was a life-saving effort to help a runner who’d gone into cardiac arrest during the Aug. 24 event.
Jenifer Veloso, a former MLive-The Flint Journal intern, her partner Sarah Satkowiak and Sarah’s dad, Pete, were traveling to different spots along the 10-mile course to photograph participants.
Veloso was working in her capacity as an associate communications officer for the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation.
Near Powers Catholic High School, a group of racers waved down the golf cart, hoping it was a medical crew.
A man was lying face down on the course and needed urgent assistance.
Veloso and the Satkowiaks, each with experience in dealing with emergency situations, sprung into action.
Sarah is a licensed EMT and served eight years as a combat medic in the Michigan Army National Guard.
She currently works as a public health nursing supervisor for sexual health and family planning at the Genesee County Health Department.
Veloso worked as a nurse in Hurley Medical Center’s Emergency Department on the trauma team and maintained her nursing license as she pursued other opportunities.
Pete, Sarah’s father, is a retired Flint Township firefighter who was trained in CPR.
The runner fell and suffered a head injury, but when Veloso and the Satkowiaks arrived, they realized the runner was suffering from something more severe.
The man had gone into cardiac arrest. When Veloso and Sarah first evaluated him, he didn’t have a pulse.
Veloso and Sarah began performing CPR, while others called 911.
Shortly after, a third nurse arrived to assist with the life-saving efforts.
“It was like I had never left the ER,” Veloso said. “I knew exactly what to do, how to do it, when to do it and how fast to do it.”
Each of the three were taking turns doing chest compressions.
At one point, Veloso and Sarah felt Pete wasn’t going down far enough in the compressions.
Sarah started counting out the compressions in rhythm, and a group of bystanders joined the counting in rhythm.
It was a special moment that Veloso will never forget.
After roughly 10 minutes, a Patriot Ambulance unit arrived and EMTs began treating the man with Veloso and Sarah’s assistance.
Sarah administered an airway device called an i-gel, which is used to manage a patient’s airway in emergency situations, thanks to her additional certification as a flight nurse.
The group determined the patient was in ventricular fibrillation, which is a life-threatening cardiac rhythm.
That’s when they made the decision to shock the patient with an automated external defibrillator.
Sarah also administered epinephrine, a hormone that increases a patient’s heart rate and blood pressure.
Given the nature of the situation, by the side of the road during a 10-mile race, Sarah wrote the time of administration on her thigh.
By the time EMTs loaded the man on to a stretcher and put him in the ambulance, his pulse had returned.
“I think you just kind of get tunnel vision because you always want to convince yourself that this isn’t really happening – I’m not really doing CPR on the side of the road,” Sarah said. “But all the training kicks in. You don’t have to think when you’ve done it so many times.”
Sarah described the scene as “controlled chaos,” as bystanders were offering help while others were running by continuing their races.
Veloso and Sarah reached out to Hurley nurses to alert them of the patient, and hours later, they learned that the man was going to be OK.
Veloso and Sarah credited the training provided to them by nurses at Hurley.
Without the training they provided, neither one of them would have been equipped to take action that day, they said.
“I’m so grateful to all the nurses that trained me, set the example and taught me how to be the nurse that I’m going to be for the rest of my life.” Veloso said. “... That place breeds a different kind of nurse.”
Pete, who served 27 years with the Flint Township Fire Department, was never asked to do CPR in the field during his career.
The first time he was able to use his training was alongside his daughter.
He gave all the credit to Sarah and Veloso – he was just there to assist in any way he could.
“This is something that I’ll remember for the rest of my life,” Pete said. “The man is truly alive today because of their efforts.”
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