Everdrone‘s Emergency Medical Aerial Delivery service, an innovative link in the chain of life-saving measures of Region Västra Götaland, Sweden, was put to the toughest of tests in the morning of December the 9th of 2021. In the Swedish city of Trollhättan, a 71-year-old man was shoveling snow in his driveway when he suffered an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA). Thanks to the combination of an immediate emergency call, the quick actions of Dr. Mustafa Ali and the swift delivery of an Automated External Defibrillator (AED), lifesaving measures through defibrillation could be initiated before the arrival of the ambulance, and his life was saved. The time from the alarm until the AED was safely delivered at the doorstep of the incident address was just over three minutes. After the initial treatment on site, the patient was rushed to the hospital and is fully recovered.
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“I can’t put into words how thankful I am to this new technology and the speedy delivery of the defibrillator. If it wasn’t for the drone I probably wouldn’t be here,” says the 71-year-old patient who has made a full recovery and now has been able to return to his home.
For Dr. Mustafa Ali the experience was just as gratifying, despite the gravity of the situation.
“I was on my way to work at the local hospital when I looked out the car window and saw a man collapsed in his driveway,” says Dr. Ali. “I immediately understood that something was wrong and rushed to help. The man had no pulse, so I started doing CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) while asking another bystander to call 112 (the Swedish emergency number). Just minutes later, I saw something flying above my head. It was a drone with a defibrillator!”
Thanks to Dr. Ali, and the use of the defibrillator, life-saving treatment was initiated early and, which in the end, meant that the life of the patient was saved.
“This is a truly revolutionary technology that needs to be implemented all over; sudden cardiac arrests can happen to anyone, not just old people with arteriosclerosis” says the patient.