ROANOKE, Va. – You don’t have to be a medical professional to save a life. One quick action — CPR or a defibrillator — can mean the difference between a family dinner next week and a phone call no one wants to receive.
That’s why a Roanoke doctor is bringing free training and automated external defibrillators to the neighborhoods that need them most. Dr. Jack Perkins, an emergency medicine physician, founded the Compress and Shock Foundation, an organization focused on teaching the public CPR and how to use a defibrillator.
“As an emergency medicine physician, unfortunately, we really only see two outcomes from cardiac arrest. One outcome is that person has regained a pulse and they’re now alive when they’re brought into the emergency department, and we take their second phase of resuscitation. Unfortunately, the large majority of outcomes is the emergency medicine physician is informing that person’s family that their loved one has died. And that leaves the emergency medicine physician with a lot of questions of what could have happened if somebody had done bystander CPR,” Dr. Perkins said.
This Saturday, the Compress and Shock Foundation will hold free EKG screenings and CPR education classes at Pilgrim Baptist Church in Roanoke and other locations across Southwest Virginia. The organization is also donating an AED to the church to help save lives in the event of a cardiac emergency.
In addition to Roanoke, the Shock and Compress foundation is holding free clinics at locations in Lexington, Rocky Mount, Chesterfield and Alexandira among others.
Registration details for an event near you can be found on the Compress and Shock website.