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Dwight

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  • Occupation
    AED Consulant

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  • Website URL
    http://elevaed.com

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  • Gender
    Male
  • Location
    Vancouver
  • Interests
    Boating, squash, travel

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  1. I advocate elevator lobbies because they have maximum security, often video, and are public. After that it becomes a community character problem, which I have no alternative to as yet. An audible alarm is pretty effective, beyond that dial-out cellphone calls form another security layer. Between these safeguards, and the eventual familiarity that AEDs will earn among these 'vertical communities', I think they'll be ignored like fire extinguishers, as a target of curiosity, in good time. But education must soak in first. When I have delivered AED PADs to customers I am always struck by the reverence they have, and express upon their arrival. They indicate their gratitude to me, but I am just the dashing installer dude. They are moved by this heart-partner sentinel now in their midst. From there the AED makes its own friends - through awareness, discussion, and the Web. Nothing like keen amateurs.
  2. Hi Richard; I do agree that there are scenarios that are a little too exposed to be realistic for open cabinets. In the buildings you cite, there may be an apartment manager on site, and in that instance he/she might have a key to a locked enclosure, or be the keeper of the AED itself. In the latter case, that building would lose much of the educational value of having a visible PAD, but at least it would be there. Hopefully it wouldn't add more than a minute to the response time. The people in such straits must take some responsibility as well - this is not a big money issue. There are tens of millions of well-heeled people right across America right now, living and working in fancy tower buildings with much less protection than a grouchy old landlady can provide. So it's not a problem just for the poor, it's an endemic failure to properly deploy a device we all have a right to access in a crisis.
  3. First, my thanks to those who have replied so far, a real eye-opener onto a situation that I suspected was there but is largely unreported. So full of absurdities, like that 4 minute walk and the medical and longterm care buildings with no AED in them. My mother was in an 'indepenedent living' facility and they were no allowed to even help her up if she fell down. Call 9-1-1? Ridiculous. As for the theft threat cited above, I think that is a barrier that has to be acknowledged when deploying AEDs. If there's one on every second floor, etc. then the likelihood of theft and vandalism, misuse, unreliability - it's just too high. The meth guys will have a field day selling them for $20 down at the bar. OTOH, one in the main elevator lobby, where there is much better security, often including video - I think we can hold that fort, and only one device is at stake. Add a good alarm, an enclosure that can dial out to cellphones, that should keep things under control. Also, the residents walking by it every day, discussing it while awaiting the elevator, that would generate a lot of awareness, education, ownership as stakeholders, in an amenity for their personal safety like no others. Lobbies also standard the their location and could build a 1:1 association in the public's mind as where these things are in a crisis - which is needed. Personally I think that retrieving one in four minutes by elevator is do-able, in my tests it works 90% of the time. With 2 stage elevators you'd need one at each landing, of course. My own company has applied to place them in the Fire Code beginning 2013, for high rises, and if that passes I think the AED promise will largely be met for big buildings. It's going to be interesting seeing who opposes them.
  4. I'm an AED consultant trying to get a handle on whether EMS can fairly be expected to reach an arrest pt in a high rise, inside the best-before time of 4 minutes. If not, I see a PAD in the lobby as a way to take some hurry heat off of vehicluar EMS. What can you tell me of SCA's in towers, etc. ?
  5. Catch and release? Accidentally roll the gurney? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOAqkDRQqFg Dwight
  6. How would it compare to Physio-Control's LifeNet? I note that they opened one more chain in the link with Airstrip technologies. Time is gold in this business, and the best architecture might be a straight time-line.?
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