©InfoFirst aider Adrian Venables helped save a man’s life at a crowded Queen tribute concert – in the dark – and it was only his second shift as a Red Cross volunteer.
A team of seven event first aid volunteers were nearing the close of their duty at the Staffordshire concert when they got an emergency call-out.
A man had collapsed while leaving the venue, fracturing his skull as he hit the ground – and was no longer breathing. Volunteers Liz Whitehead and Adrian Venables raced to the scene, where Adrian immediately started giving CPR treatment while Liz called for back-up.
Effective treatment
A third volunteer quickly connected the patient to a defibrillator, which instructed ‘No shock advised’. Liz explained: “That’s generally the last thing you want to hear because it often means there’s nothing you can do.
“However, this time it turned out no shock was needed because Adrian’s CPR treatment had already got the casualty’s heart going again. As he came round, we put him in the recovery position and attended to his serious head wound.”
It was a difficult response. Liz said: “There was no lighting in the area so we had to work using only our ambulance’s headlights and the volunteers also had to keep the crowds back as hundreds started to leave the venue.
Unusual situation
By the time the ambulance service arrived, the patient was breathing and speaking again – but the first aiders’ work was far from done. The stress of the situation had prompted the man’s wife to have an angina attack. The paramedics gave her morphine, then asked the volunteers to take her to hospital in their Red Cross ambulance.
Afterwards, Liz recalled: “It was a very unusual situation given that, on top of everything else, the man had a skull fracture and his wife suffered an angina attack. But everyone’s training kicked in and the whole team coped with the situation brilliantly.”
Adrian added: “When something like that happens, the adrenaline takes over and you just do what you’re trained to do. You don’t get a chance for feelings.”