AN EBBW Vale butcher who had a cardiac arrest has thanked the ambulance staff who saved his life.
Daniel Grist, 41, had just collected his children from school before collapsing in the family kitchen in the late afternoon.
Experiencing very few symptoms, the father-of-two went into cardiac arrest in front of his wife Danielle, who called 999.
A Welsh Ambulance Service call handler guided her through cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) before ambulance crews arrived.
Daniel said: “I have complete memory loss from the day.
“I find it crazy; I felt slightly unwell, so I left work early which is completely out of character.
“I went shopping at B&Q with my wife, and I even picked my daughter up from school, and I can’t remember any of it.
“The whole run-up to my cardiac arrest is just a mystery, although some details have now been filled in by others.”
When Daniel collapsed, Danielle, a teaching assistant, quickly shut the children in the living room and gave CPR to her husband in the kitchen during the minutes before ambulance crews arrived.
Duty Operations Managers Darren Bright and Mark Sutherland arrived within six minutes, followed closely by Cymru High Acuity Response Unit Paramedic Joe Murphy and Paramedics Darren Hubbard and Ian Thorne.
Darren said: “Mark and I were about to go home and had already started to log off, ut the call came in, so we jumped on a rapid response car and headed straight there.
“All the stars aligned for this call, as three separate resources had become available and were directed straight to Daniel.
“Although we arrived so quickly, I don’t think we would have got him back without his family administering CPR in those vital minutes before we were on scene.
“In total, we delivered five shocks from a defibrillator and were able to get him back.”
The team were joined by Emergency Medical Retrieval and Transfer Service Dr Kosta Morely, who arrived in a Wales Air Ambulance charity helicopter and provided advanced critical care to Daniel.
Once stable enough, crews transported Daniel to Cardiff’s University Hospital Wales.
Daniel said: “I was fitted with an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator and was in hospital for five weeks, including over Christmas.
“I’ve had a health battle for many years, including skin cancer in my leg 14 years ago, which I’ve been cleared.
"I also suffered a stroke three years ago and back in October, I collapsed after experiencing chest pain.
“But this time, it’s really damaged me, and I’m just very overwhelmed.
“I’m still in pain, and I’m taking it day by day, but it’s a very small price to pay to bring me back to my family and I’m just thankful to all the staff who helped save my life.”
Today marks the start of Defibuary, the Welsh Ambulance Service’s annual month-long campaign designed to educate the public about the importance of bystander CPR and defibrillation.
In Wales, 80% of cardiac arrests occur in the home and according to the British Heart Foundation, only one in ten people survive an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in the UK.
When someone has a cardiac arrest, they collapse and become unresponsive.
They either stop breathing entirely, or they may take gasping or infrequent breaths for a few minutes, which can be misinterpreted as snoring.
If you see someone in cardiac arrest, phone 999 and start CPR.
The Resuscitation Council UK has produced a step-by-step guide to doing CPR:
How to do CPR | Resuscitation Council UK
An ambulance call handler will tell you where your nearest defibrillator is.
All new and existing defibrillators must be registered on the national defibrillator network The Circuit so that 999 call handlers can see their location:
The Circuit - the national defibrillator network
Editor’s Notes
For more information, please email Communications Officer Beth.Eales@wales.nhs.u