July 07, 2005
New device gets jump on saving hearts
By Chris McKenna
Times Herald-Record
[email protected]
Kiryas Joel – Looks like pretty simple equipment: a plastic, rectangular board no bigger than a desk top, with a thick strap on each side and a small electronic gadget in one corner.
But the 29-pound resuscitation machine laid out for a demonstration yesterday inside the Kiryas Joel ambulance garage has a profound purpose: saving people whose hearts have stopped beating.
This new device, perhaps the first of its kind in the Hudson Valley since coming on the market last year, was created to improve a patient's chances of surviving cardiac arrest by doing with greater precision and consistency what emergency workers have always done with their hands.
The patient is placed on the board and the Velcro straps fastened across his or her chest. In just a minute or so, the machine begins compressing the chest with the tightened straps at a steady rate to pump blood through the body, bringing vital oxygen to the heart, brain and other organs.
It has one advantage over manual cardiopulmonary resuscitation: more oxygen circulates. The device delivers 70 percent to 80 percent of a patient's normal oxygen supply, vs. a 30 percent "profusion" rate with manual CPR, said Morris Steinberg, director of the Kiryas Joel Community Ambulance Corps.
Another benefit is that the machines don't feel fatigue.
"Humans get tired after a few minutes, and then your CPR is no longer effective," said Steven Fishbein, a paid Kiryas Joel paramedic.
The machine also beats man in this case because the rate and depth of compression stay constant. In addition, the device can continue operating while a patient is carried downstairs or transported in an ambulance.
The AutoPulse Non-Invasive Cardiac Support Pump is made by Zoll Medical Corp. of Chelmsford, Mass. The Food and Drug Administration approved its sale in March 2004.
Kiryas Joel's ambulance service bought one for about $17,000 soon after learning about it. The ambulance service has had one on loan from the company for about a month while waiting for its own AutoPulse to be delivered.
So far, it hasn't had to use the machine.
The CPR machine mimics the simplicity and convenience of another gadget that is commonly used to treat cardiac-arrest patients outside of hospitals – the automated external defibrillator, or AED, which can shock the heart.
Roughly the size of a laptop computer, the AED is standard equipment in ambulances. Fifteen Kiryas Joel volunteers have them in their private vehicles; it is also carried by police in their cruisers. Places with large crowds, such as stadiums and airports, also have the devices.
If it catches on, AutoPulse – and whatever other competing brands arise – would further mechanize cardiac-arrest treatment.
So far, Kiryas Joel appears to have the only ambulance service in the region deploying one.
Raphael Barishansky, executive director of the council that coordinates emergency medical services in six Hudson Valley counties, including Orange, Ulster and Sullivan, said he knows of no other agencies that have bought the new CPR machine.
"Kiryas Joel is being progressive in procuring this equipment," he said.
