Pilot Program Leverages Off-Duty Professional Firefighters, Technology and Defibrillators to Save Lives

Each year, approximately 350,000 cardiac arrests occur outside a hospital setting in the United States. Nearly 90 percent of these events prove fatal, and the chance of survival decreases by ten percent with every passing minute without CPR.* Though survival rates in the Northwest exceed the national average, a coalition of professional first responders, clinicians, researchers and a leading medical equipment manufacturer aim to make the region the frontrunner in cardiac arrest response and survival. The PulsePoint Foundation, Tualatin Valley Fire & Rescue, International Association of…