Crittenden Regional Hospital Foundation Purchases New Defibrillator Trainer

The Crittenden Regional Hospital Foundation today announced it has purchased a new automated external defibrillator training device for the hospital through the generosity of an anonymous donor.

The Laerdal^® AED Trainer 2 is an affordable alternative for educating members of the community and hospital staff on the effective use of an automatic external defibrillator. The new AED is now programmable to set to various scenarios involved in heart attack resuscitation without the alarming shock of the old system.

“It’s been proven that the first few minutes of a heart attack are the most critical,” said Jerry McGill, nurse educator and CPR coordinator for Crittenden Regional Hospital. “Our new AED trainer will benefit patients and the community as it will help anyone trained to know exactly how to use it right away. With more than 10 different pre-programmed scenarios, the new AED trainer helps trainees to be better familiar with situations where they would have to be flexible in their resuscitation methods based on specific variables. We are so grateful to have this device for our community.”

According to McGill, the hospital trained more than 30 members of the community through classes in the first month of using the trainer.

“We are very proud to have generous donors who want to help the hospital provide the most updated equipment to help our patients and the community,” said Chris Chastain, executive director of the Crittenden Regional Hospital Foundation. “The addition of the new AED trainer has been well-received by our staff and those in the classes. To have the flexibility of helping heart attack victims in a variety of scenarios goes a long way in saving people’s lives.”