Saintfield survivor backs company’s drive to place defibrillators in stores

Saintfield survivor backs company’s drive to place defibrillators in stores

7 October 2015

A SAINTFIELD woman who survived a cardiac arrest against all the odds has given her backing to a campaign for 300 defibrillators to be installed throughout Northern Ireland.

A stroke of extraordinary good luck saw two lifesavers pass Lynda Donaldson’s doorstep seconds after she collapsed from a cardiac arrest that would have killed her before an ambulance could arrive.

The incident outside her Main Street diner business in Saintfield took place in January 2011 — witnessed first by a nurse who was driving by, and secondly by a trained user of heart defibrillators, who also happened to be carrying one at the time.

It’s an incident that has changed Lynda’s life and led to her working with the British Heart Foundation, the HeartStart Lisburn and Mid Down team, and Defibs4Kids, giving talks in local schools and training in essential lifesaving skills.

Now she is backing the campaign for the new defibrillators launched by the Henderson Group, which wants to see 300 installed in Spar, Eurospar and Vivo stores. Twelve shops in South Down have already signed up and it is intended the defibrillators will be available to the public throughout 2016.

Community and store fundraising at each outlet signed up will fund the devices, with a £1,500 target to purchase the product, its temperature controlled cabinet and installation. 

“To have another 300 defibrillators in Northern Ireland will be fabulous,” said Lynda.

“I have told my story so many times now while out giving talks and people are always very interested.”

Lynda said that her HeartStart talks to schools, community groups and sports clubs were about providing people with the information they need.

“These groups fundraise themselves and we go to talk to them about defibrillators and CPR,” she said. “We want to see CPR being taken seriously.”

As an example of the help out there, Lynda pointed to the offer of a free training kit for post-primary schools from the British Heart Foundation’s Call Push Rescue Campaign. The training kit covers how and when to perform CPR on an adult or child, put someone in the recovery position and use a public access defibrillator.

“Twenty-two schools in Northern Ireland have taken up the offer,” she said. “Many haven’t and it’s a free kit.”

When she recalled her own near-fatal collapse four years ago, Lynda said she remembered suddenly feeling dizzy.

“I came round lying on the ground,” she said. “A nurse had stopped to help me, called Michelle. She was leaning over me, she was saying ‘have you any pain?’

“It was then I realised that I had been out of it and she had been working on me.

“She had just been driving past and just stopped her car to help me when she saw me on the ground.”

Lynda was also unaware of her significance of her second helper, a first aider called Phil Batt, who is now in charge of the Lagan Search and Rescue Team.

“Eight minutes after a cardiac arrest like this and you are gone, I realised later,” she said. “Phil had been driving past and had a defibrillator in the car. He just stopped the car in the traffic and jumped over the railings. The first shock from the defibrillator was successful.”

Lynda had experienced a ventricular fibrillation (VF) cardiac arrest, during which the heart cannot find a rhythm. Taken to the Royal Victoria Hospital she underwent CAT scans and various other heart tests.

“They did not find anything,” she said. “They could not find any reason or cause and they said it could happen again.

“People get confused about the difference between heart attacks and cardiac arrests. With cardiac arrests there is a severely abnormal heart rhythm and there is only a six per cent chance of survival as very often there is not a defibrillator.

“One of the consultants in the Royal kept calling me the miracle defibrillator woman.”

Henderson Group’s Bronagh Luke, who has pioneered the new defibrillator campaign with her colleagues, said: “At the heart of our business we are passionate about local. We hope that every local community will get behind their store’s fundraising campaign and ensure more life-saving devices are on hand, and we encourage retailers and communities to educate themselves with lifesaving practices should an unfortunate incident occur in their area.

“We will have an education campaign running alongside the fundraising campaigns both digitally via specially produced ‘how to use’ videos, and with printed, practical information readily available in store.”

More about the fundraising campaign can be found at www.heartofourcommunityni.com and on social media via the #DefibDonate hashtag.

Anyone wishing to contact Lynda Donaldson for information on talks and training can do so on 028 9260 3307. Contact can also be made with Lynda through the British Heart Foundation website.