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Sudden Cardiac Arrest can strike anyone, anywhere, anytime.
It does not respect age or physical fitness. More….
It is often brought on by ventricular fibrillation, a cardiac
electrical malfunction. The heart abruptly stops beating
effectively, breathing also stops. Left untreated,
this condition will result in death within minutes.
The only treatment for ventricular fibrillation is defibrillation
- the delivery of therapeutic electrical shock to convert a
fatal rhythm back to normal. This must be effected as soon
as possible, as the survival rate decreases by 10% per minute.
The sooner defibrillation is started, the more likely the
victim will survive.
The current survival rate of SCA is only 3-5%, as the necessary
defibrillation equipment has traditionally been confined to
the emergency services. This is because the first and second
generation AED equipment was expensive, and required technical
and medical expertise. It required a background paramedic expertise.
The average emergency services response time to SCA is between
6 -12 minutes. While this is very impressive, it is easy to
see that it is not fast enough to improve the chances of the
SCA victim’s survival. It requires immediate local access.
If the victim could be defibrillated within 4 -5 minutes,
the survival rate could increase to 50% - 75%. This goal could
be achieved with the local available placement of AED's within
the community.
AED Direct has been formed specifically to address the
needs of this segment of the medical equipment marketplace.
We supply 3rd generation AED's. Why?
These machines are designed to be used by non medically trained
infrequent rescuers, as well as the emergency services. This
means that availability of treatment for SCA can dramatically
increase.
An AED is an Automated External Defibrillator. These laptop
size boxes analyse the heartbeat and determine if and when
it should administer an electric shock to restart the heart
in the event of Sudden Cardiac Arrest. They are fully portable
and require minimal training.
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