Every minute counts.
In France, 50,000 people die each year from cardiac arrest.
To try to save them, you must intervene within four minutes of the heart failure.
But help arrives on average 10 minutes after the emergency call.
So, in an attempt to provide cardiac massages more quickly, two developers have adapted the free Staying Alive application which originally listed defibrillators in public places.
In 2017, they signed a partnership with the Paris Fire Brigade (BSPP) which can now trigger trained volunteer citizens, called “good Samaritans”, when they receive a call on 18 or 112 for cardiac arrest.
Since then, the application has developed at high speed, especially in 2020. This week, it has just exceeded 10,000 trips by firefighters in 60 French departments.
The entire PACA region is covered, the entire Île-de-France except Essonne and seven of the eight departments of Bourgogne Franche-Comté.
This Friday, the Ardèche firefighters signed an agreement to use the application.
The latter has a community of 130,000 Samaritans, the vast majority of whom are trained in life-saving skills as part of their professional activity or training.
A figure that jumped 63% last year.
For example, in the Yvelines, they were 400 volunteers at the launch in July 2018, they are now more than 3,000.
"The man's complexion has gone from gray to colored!"
Alix Romatet, 26, is one of these volunteer citizen rescuers.
This Parisian who works as a consultant is even the Samaritan woman most in demand by the Paris firefighters.
After downloading the application during his training as a civil protection first aid worker, three years ago, it was “triggered” ten times!
“I had nothing in the first year and almost forgot about the app.
Last month I was knocked twice in a week.
I do not know if I am a black cat or an ambassador ”, she wonders, while the five employees of the application still cannot believe it.
Two years ago, she took an active part in saving a man in cardiac arrest in the capital.
Between two work meetings, her phone vibrates to alert her.
After accepting the mission, a map appears on his screen to help him find the bar where the victim is located.
“I left my post without saying anything, ran and tumbled into the bar.
I said that the firemen sent me and started the cardiac massage… Foam was coming out of the man's mouth, ”she recalls.
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After at least three minutes of massage which seemed interminable to him, help arrived.
The heart will pick up quickly.
The young woman's rapid intervention was surely beneficial.
“Suddenly, her skin tone went from gray to colored!
Alix still can't believe it.
The firefighters will warmly thank her.
"Compliments that we are not used to receiving," she blushed.
But not always everything goes so well.
Last summer, his phone rang at the cinema.
She rushes to an individual.
At the end of the line, the firefighters will guide her using geolocation and give her the access codes to the building.
The man choked on brioche.
Despite half an hour of cardiac massage, the heart of the sexagenarian will no longer beat.
“It was rue Faubourg-Saint-Honoré,” she recalls with precision.
It was shocking, we go out with our arms dangling ... "
Staying Alive and Firefighters Need More Good Samaritans
After each intervention, the Good Samaritans are contacted by email to tell their experience.
They have the option of being called if they need help.
“I never turn off the app.
I feel guilty about missing the alerts.
There is nothing more important than saving lives, ”concludes the one who talks about Staying Alive all around her.
A study conducted by APHP and BSPP proves that 35% of people who received heart massage from Good Samaritans, present within 500 m, before the arrival of help, have been saved.
Against 16% for those who had to wait.
"If we do not have figures of the number of lives saved since 2017 since hospitals cannot communicate details on the care of patients, we know that this figure is increasing because we have more and more calls from firefighters to tell us that the victims regained cardiac activity on their arrival ”, appreciates Laurent Istria, development manager of Staying Alive, funded by patrons.
She even accepts untrained Good Samaritans who are responsible for fetching a defibrillator through the app.
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In the Yvelines, 3,000 individual volunteers are ready to save your life
This is what happened at the end of January in the Gers at Fleurance.
A 23-year-old nursery caregiver and reservist gendarme rescued a 73-year-old man in the street after being contacted by the application.
“This is proof that it works!
Because with our response times in a department where our barracks are made up of 95% volunteer firefighters, the chances of survival are lower.
We arrive on average ten minutes after the call, ”reveals Colonel Xavier Pergaud, deputy director of the departmental fire and rescue service (Sdis) of Gers.
The officer is delighted to have seen the heart of the septuagenarian restart after being shocked by a defibrillator.
“In the Gers, we are called upon for 150 to 200 cardiac arrests per year.
But we only have 1000 Good Samaritans, it would take at least 5000 to cover the territory, ”calculates the official, who wants to train citizens on a massive scale in saving gestures.
What Thomas, 33, a corporal at the BSPP and a Good Samaritan, does.
In a year and a half, this inhabitant of Hauts-de-Seine has already been triggered three times when he was not in the barracks and thus revived a forty-year-old from Val-de-Marne.
In his spare time, he trains civilians.
“It's true that when I'm on call and faced with cardiac arrests, witnesses rarely do the right thing.
It's annoying and frustrating, because if they massaged it could save lives ... "
