They live amongst us ………

[Nick Jones]

Possibly controversial but I would really like to see some numbers for the actual “save rates” for the national defibrillator fleet.

The save rates for cardiac arrests are dismal even in hospital settings. Out in the wild (as it were) surely far worse.  You do see the occasional claimed save publicised but…..

To be effective they need to be applied ASAP, under 4 minutes for sure. So you really need to arrange to have your arrest right by the device, and obviously in sight of someone able to step right up and work it (not hard). You probably should choose one not protected by a combination lock where your would-be saviour first has to ring and negotiate with the emergency services to get hold of it….. that’s precious seconds/minutes gone…..

We have one in the village, owned and maintained by the parish council. It lives in the church porch, handy for me (by chance) but quite a way from much of the village. There’s a lobby that wants to buy another for the other side of the village (120 houses!). No! There’s nowhere to put it, it costs £1,500 to buy, has to be checked every week (I do the existing one) and periodically has to have new batteries (£60) and pads (£150).  Ours has been used twice. Once unsuccessfully and once unnecessarily. New pads each time obviously…..

I think they are a great idea where people gather in numbers, but scattered around a sparsely populated landscape they are pretty pointless.

[JohnD]

No argument with any of your points, Nick.

Survival from cardiac arrest "out of hospital" in the UK is no better than 8%.   But where the people are widely taught Basic Life Support (BLS) it can be much greater.    In Stavanger, Norway (The home of Leardal, which makes ResuciAnne teaching mannikins and all sorts of resus kit!) the school kids get taught to do external cardiac massage, 'saver' breaths and how to use the automatic external defibrillator (AED).    There 25% of people who suffer an out of hospital arrest will survive!

In the UK, BLS is part of the secondary school curriculum, and every school has at least one AED, but clearly this has had little impact yet.  CPR in Secondary Schools | Resuscitation Council UK   I expect yours, Nick is registered with the local Ambulance Service, as when a 999 call might be an arrest, the operator can press a button to see where the nearest AED is to the incident.  Because even with BLS, in the commonest cause of arrest (Fibrillation) every minute that defibrillation is delayed, survival decreases by 10%.

Anyone - ANYONE! - can learn to do BLS, and using an AED is easy!             

Please see: https://www.resus.org.uk/public-resource  

And, try "Lifesaver": Lifesaver (life-saver.org.uk)  An interactive film that shows how to act for young or old who collapse.

John

Edited November 28, 2023 by JohnD

[Nick Jones]

Yes, ours is registered with South West Ambulance Trust, which requires weekly reporting and more recently with another register that needs monthly reporting.

We’ve run a few BLS training sessions in the village. We are fortunate enough to have a specialist nurse in the village who does it for us. The main problem is getting people to attend.

[JohnD]

Is there a village school , Nick?   The kids would love it!

[Nick Jones]

Nope. School long gone. We have the church…. A small church hall…. And…. A post box.

[JMH]

On 11/28/2023 at 7:02 PM, JohnD said:

Survival from cardiac arrest "out of hospital" in the UK is no better than 8%.   

Around 10% (*edit*) in 2022 14% in general, 16,1% in Copenhagen Area (sorry, in Danish only): out of hospital cardiac arrest:

https://hjertestopregister.dk/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Aarsrapport-fra-Dansk-Hjertestopregister-2022.pdf

Have been implementing these, first in Greater Copenhagen, now in hole country

https://heartrunner.com/

Edited November 30, 2023 by JMH

[JohnD]

Godt gået, Danmark!

JOhn

[JMH]

On 11/30/2023 at 7:24 PM, JohnD said:

Godt gået, Danmark!

JOhn

All credit to the Swedish company HeartRunner :-) 

[JohnD]

HeartRunner do their best, but they are in Solna, Sweden, where survival from Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest (OHCA) is- 11%.     Which is a lot better than it was thirty years ago when it was about 5%, and better than in the UK today.   Cardiac arrest survival rate rising | University of Gothenburg (gu.se)  Rawshani, A. 2022, The probability of surviving sudden cardiac arrest outside hospital has more than doubled in 30 years. Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg. 

 Stavanger and Laerdal are in Norway.

John

Edited December 4, 2023 by JohnD

[Nick Jones]

Back to “they live amongst us”

It’s been wet for weeks, but really very wet in the last 24 hours. Yesterday afternoon I emptied the rain gauge. At 10am this morning I noticed it was overflowing. That’s at least 60mm. I’ve just checked it again and found 32mm. That’s almost 4” in 24 hours. 
 

Unsurprisingly this has caused a lot of flooding. The local roads are a disaster area. Not helped by the numerous morons who’ll drive into anything, usually at speed and then be surprised when their car/van/lorry craps out in the middle. Quite often the road was perfectly passable with the correct technique, but now it’s blocked by a dead BMW/Jag/Audi/Mercedes/LandRover product. Sometimes they’ll even drive around road closed signs to get to the flood.  The main road through the village has 3 feet of water over it where it crosses the stream. There were several dead cars and a van in it earlier. There is a depth indicator…… not even I will try 3’ in an ordinary car. 2’…… it may have happened 

[John I]

12 hours ago, Nick Jones said:

. There is a depth indicator…… not even I will try 3’ in an ordinary car. 2’…… it may have happened 

Even at 2ft that’s pretty adventurous.......18 inches, dead flat and no running/moving water slow and steady 

[RogerH]

 It can't be that deep - it only comes 1/2 way up the ducks

 

 

 

[JohnD]

This is when  Lancaster was flooded, 2015.

Yes, even Rollers won't roll on water.

John

[Nick Jones]

19 minutes ago, John I said:

Even at 2ft that’s pretty adventurous

Yeah. The back was floating - not a great feeling  

Was fully committed - had failed realise/remember the ground was lower around the corner, so no choice at that point, just kept going at a steady walking pace and got away with it…. Not even wet carpets…

Hopefully I learnt something.

[yorkshire_spam]

I'm just waiting for the local news to do their annual "which bits of the Calder valley are under water this winter" update. I don't know how the valley bottom residents of Luddenden foot, Mytholmroyd, Hebden Bridge etc. put up with it to be honest. 

[John I]

52 minutes ago, Nick Jones said:

Yeah. The back was floating - not a great feeling  

Was fully committed - had failed realise/remember the ground was lower around the corner, so no choice at that point, just kept going at a steady walking pace and got away with it…. Not even wet carpets…

Hopefully I learnt something.

Floating......need a few passengers in the back that should help. No wet carpets is a result and shows how good your door seals still are 

[Nick Jones]

This was a few years back. Only did about 50m @ 12 - 18” last night. No dramas apart from having to herd another car backwards for about 300m (not flooded at that point) as the only passing place in my direction was at the deepest point and I wasn’t going reverse back!  
 

As it turned out she was a non-local looking for a way around the closed road. This one doesn’t go anywhere except the industrial estate - and that’s flooded too!

[JohnD]

5 hours ago, yorkshire_spam said:

I'm just waiting for the local news to do their annual "which bits of the Calder valley are under water this winter" update. I don't know how the valley bottom residents of Luddenden foot, Mytholmroyd, Hebden Bridge etc. put up with it to be honest. 

Webbed feet?

[yorkshire_spam]

9 minutes ago, JohnD said:

Webbed feet?

Could well be, I think somebody down that valley has been widdling in the shallow end of the gene pool. See TV series "Happy Valley"

[Nick Jones]

Today, at work we were discussing the “they live amongst us” concept. Can’t remember how we got there but…. The alarming conclusion was that in fact “we” are outnumbered…… which means that we live amongst them….

Bugger…

[yorkshire_spam]

10 hours ago, Nick Jones said:

The alarming conclusion was that in fact “we” are outnumbered…… which means that we live amongst them….

Absolutely true, sadly. 

[Escadrille Ecosse]

10 hours ago, Nick Jones said:

Today, at work we were discussing the “they live amongst us” concept. Can’t remember how we got there but…. The alarming conclusion was that in fact “we” are outnumbered…… which means that we live amongst them….

Bugger…

The bell curve of humanity.

To be fair the majority of humans are mostly just 'absent' and disinterested with all the 'good stuff' delivered by the minority at one end of the curve. 

And of course the group at the other end doing their best to wreck things. Quite often completely unconsciously.

Back to Shaw's "since the 'reasonable' man darts himself to his circumstances, all progress must depend on the 'unreasonable' man".

Vexing nonetheless though...

[Nick Jones]

46 minutes ago, Escadrille Ecosse said:

Vexing nonetheless though...

Yeah. 

The boss suggested a T shirt.  "We live amongst them" on the front, "if you have to ask you won't understand" on the back......

Just reading "Pathogenesis" by Jonathan Kennedy.  This illustrates the bellcurve comment quite well in places.  Not a light read but interesting, with some particularly eye-popping stuff early on.  Observations on Roman "hygiene" Bluuuuurgh! 

[Escadrille Ecosse]

I like the T shirt idea

12 minutes ago, Nick Jones said:

Observations on Roman "hygiene" Bluuuuurgh!