First Life Saved with KSMH AED!!!!

Kick Start My Heart are very excited and proud to confirm the very first life saving incident involving an Automated External Defibrillator placed through our foundation!! On July 16 this year, Karl Ray, an engineer and soccer referee from Colorado Springs was saved using CPR and a Kick Start My Heart AED placed with the Colorado Rush Soccer Club.

The quick thinking of spectators, including Jaclyn Adams, an Athletic Trainer with the Boulder Center for Sports Medicine and the availability of the Kick Start My Heart / Colorado Rush AED contributed to saving Karl's life. After recently meeting with Karl, we are excited that he is willing to share his story and be involved in our ongoing AED awareness and fundraising efforts.

Please read on for full details of Karl's wonderful life-saving success story...  

"My sudden cardiac arrest occurred at 5:01 p.m. July 16, 2011. I was refereeing a 17 year-old girls soccer game at the Elite Clubs National Championships. It was hot, in the 90s all day, and they were short on referees due to other tournaments and the heat. It was my third game of the day. Seventeen minutes into the game, I noticed that the sky suddenly appeared strange, as in a cartoon. “Focus on the game!”, I demanded of myself.

I think that if my life were a movie, at this point I would have left my body, traveled towards a white light, gazed down as a spectator started CPR, and continued watching as a golf cart carrying an athletic trainer and an AED arrived moments later. At 5:02:24 the trainer connected the pads to the AED and pressed the on button (I know this because she later mailed me a copy of the ECG trace). In less than 20 seconds, she cut through my shirt and applied the pads to my chest. At 5:03:03 the AED announced “Shock advised.” Within a second, the trainer armed the AED and moved back. Five seconds later, at 5:03:10, the ECG trace shot off the scale and the device recorded, “Shock delivered.” In my life, the movie version, the angel looking down with me said, “You have to go back. It's not your time.” As the trainer continued chest compressions, my heart began to beat on its own, weakly at first, but gradually becoming more regular.

In real-life, I was unconscious for a few minutes. I saw no white light, had no out of body experience, and no angel sent me back. I found myself lying on the soccer field, with my real-life angel, Trainer Jaclyn Adams, looking at me. “Are you single?”, she asked. Seizing the opportunity, I replied that I was indeed, but I thought she was maybe a bit young. “No,” she said. “Are you here with family?” I tried to get up to resume the soccer match but the spectators told me to remain still and wait for the ambulance. It was only then that I came to realize that I was connected to an AED.

The ride to the hospital was uneventful – $1,200 for a five minute ride and they didn't even turn on the lights or siren! I was alert and chatted with the ambulance crew as they went about their business. We arrived at University Hospital around 5:30. Nearly a dozen students were waiting in the emergency room as I was wheeled in. “Nobody arrives in an ambulance alert and talking after a cardiac arrest,” I was told. “They are here to see for themselves what is possible when CPR is started immediately and a defibrillator is used within minutes.”

Over and over doctors have remarked on my very good fortune. I lead an active life: running, hiking, soccer. The doctors haven't pinpointed what led to the sudden cardiac arrest, but if it had happened on a trail or somewhere else where there weren't people trained in CPR and a defibrillator, I would likely not have not survived. Because of the quick action of the spectators and Trainer Jaclyn and the AED being nearby, I returned to consciousness in minutes and suffered few ill effects. I was up walking the next day and went for a first, short, easy hike within a week. Five weeks later, I returned to the field and refereed some easier games.

I am thankful that because of the efforts of Kick Start My Heart, Rush Soccer Club, the anonymous spectator who started CPR, and the quick action of Trainer Jaclyn, that I am one of the lucky people to survive sudden cardiac arrest with few, if any, ill effects. I thank them for giving me a second chance at life."