Automated external defibrillators, machines used to shock the heart back into proper rhythm, are already found on the walls of many US airports. New studies suggest that putting them in other public places such as high schools could help save even more lives. The defibrillator devices are designed to be user friendly so that a good Samaritan with no special training can use one effectively. In more than 1700 high schools with a defibrillator available on site, about 60 percent of the cardiac arrest victims survived. In high schools without defibrillators, the survival rate was a dismal 5 percent. Most of the heart attack victims in high schools are adults, but cardiac arrest may also occur in young athletes.
[Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association, August 11, 2009]
