Kettering police commended Officer Whitney McManus after she performed CPR and used an automated external defibrillator during a Sept. 5 emergency at a home on Osage Avenue. The woman was unresponsive on a bathroom floor when McManus arrived, according to WHIO-TV. McManus moved her to the living room, began chest compressions and delivered one shock as directed by the AED. She continued CPR until Kettering Fire Department medics took over.
The woman was taken to a hospital. By Sept. 8, she was awake and talking in a cardiac recovery area while being treated for a possible cardiac event, WHIO reported. Police credited the quick response and AED use with helping save her life; the available account does not establish how much any one part of the response contributed to her recovery.
The department’s commendation recognized McManus’s communication with dispatch and her calm response, as well as her CPR and AED use. Dayton 24/7 Now, reporting on a Kettering police Facebook post, said the department praised her for relaying medical information, asking medical questions and carrying out the lifesaving measures without interruption.
What national cardiac-arrest figures show
The Ohio Department of Health, citing the CDC, says more than 356,000 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests occur annually in the United States and estimates that 70% to 90% of those affected die before reaching a hospital. The Cardiac Arrest Registry to Enhance Survival reports a median survival-to-hospital-discharge rate of 10.4% for out-of-hospital cardiac-arrest cases. These are national figures describing different points in the outcome process; neither provides an Ohio-specific rate or a measure of the effect of CPR or AED use in McManus’s case.
