ASHI and MEDIC First Aid Blog

Let’s celebrate some ASHI and MEDIC First Aid student heroes who had the confidence to respond and used their emergency care training to save a life.

From ASHI instructor Jamie Carrow of Norfolk, VA, we learned of Christopher Woods, who rescued a coworker who collapsed on May 4, 2016.

During a conversation with another employee, the injured party folded his arms against his body and began to shout and violently shake. He then collapsed shaking to the floor and continued to shake. The employee with the patient immediately called for help and held the man’s head off the floor.

Fellow employee Christopher Woods responded to the call for help. When he approached the scene, he found the injured party was still shaking on the floor with his head against the wall. Christopher directed his coworker to call 911 and began to readjust the injured party so that his body was completely horizontal to the floor.

After the man’s body was flat on the floor, Christopher observed that the injured party became still and was no long shaking. He also saw that the man had stopped breathing. He immediately performed CPR and gave approximately 40-60 compressions when the patient opened his eyes and began shaking again. It was then that the paramedics arrived and took charge of the incident.

Jason Davis, a MEDIC First Aid instructor in Clatskanie, OR, let us know about his student Julie Pense, who came to the rescue on July 4, 2015 during a visit to Rockaway Beach.

Julie and her family were at the popular beach town attending the annual Independence Day parade when she witnessed a middle-aged man collapse near her.

Julie remembered her emergency care training and immediately took action. She assessed the patient and determined that he was in cardiac arrest. Julie quickly began CPR and directed others to call 911 for EMS assistance.

Traffic in the area was very congested due to the parade, and the ambulance sirens were initially ignored as “just part of the parade.” But Julie was on task and continued CPR for several minutes until the ALS unit finally made its way to her and relieved her.

Julie then assisted with crowd control and directed traffic to clear a path for the ambulance to depart safely with the cardiac patient.

Instructor Davis reports that, after the scene was clear, Julie’s preteen son looked at her and said, "Mom, you just saved that man's life!" Her modest response was, "I was just doing what I was trained to do.”

A big thank you to Christopher and Julie and all our emergency care students who bravely answer the call to come to the aid of someone experiencing a medical emergency.

Instructors, do you have some heroes you want to acknowledge? Submit their story to us and we’ll send you a Good Samaritan certificate to present to your student. To access our Good Samaritan form, just click the button below.