Defibrillator donated to hotspot for rural walkers

A DEFIBRILLATOR was donated to a farmers’ market in Ipsden.

Blue Tin Produce has received the device as part of the Millie’s Dream appeal, bringing the number to 86 defibrillators in and around Henley. It is located at the farm shop’s outdoor coffee bar.

The appeal was launched in 2013 by Sarah Roberts whose daughter Millie has a heart and lung condition.

Emma Darke, who launched the business with her husband Jed Jackson in 2009, had been looking to get one for a long time after coming across an injured man in the woods when she was walking with their two sons Jake and Johnny.

A runner had collapsed and after calling emergency services, Ms Darke saw that there was no ambulance access or anywhere for a helicopter to land if it was needed.

Paramedics had to walk through a gate into the woods with a stretcher to get the runner into the ambulance which was waiting on the road.

Ms Darke said: “It wasn’t a defibrillator incident but it makes you aware that there’s just nothing around.

“We are a very rural spot and the top of a big hill. We get lots of cyclists, runners and hikers going past us because we are surrounded by all these amazing bits of countryside.

“We had been looking at the British Heart Foundation to get a defibrillator but it’s such a complex thing to know what to get.

“I emailed Sarah to ask if it was the right place to have a defibrillator and she said: ‘Absolutely, it’s 100 per cent the right place because of its rural nature’.”

The area is part of the National Cycle Network, the Chiltern Way and  the device has a system which talks the user through how to use it.

Ms Darke said: “You hope it will never have to be used but if we did have to use it without knowing how to beforehand, we’d probably go into panic mode and ‘What do we do now?’. We want to be proficient so we can act quickly if we need to.”

Ms Darke registered the device to The Circuit, which is the national defibrillator network which shows NHS ambulance workers where the closest one is to a person in need.

Ms Darke is “thrilled” to be a part of Ms Roberts’s project.

She said: “I think it must be a very personal journey for Sarah. The reality of 86 in this area must be monumental. Even if just one person is saved, it’s an incredible thing to have them.”

This is the first defibrillator in Ipsden. The nearest ones are at Checkendon Primary School, Goring and Wallingford, which are all at least four miles from the village. The first aim for Millie’s Dream was to provide the lifesaving equipment for the six primary schools in Henley as well as those in Sonning Common, Peppard, Checkendon and Crazies Hill. The following year, she decided to help communities buy their own.

Millie, 16, was born with tracheobronchial malacia, a narrowing of her windpipe, and was subsequently diagnosed with paroxysmal atrial tachycardia, an electrical malfunction of the heart which in severe cases may be life-threatening.

After researching the condition, Mrs Roberts bought the family an automated external defibrillator to have at home.

But, following the story of footballer Fabrice Muamba suffering a cardiac arrest on the pitch and surviving thanks to a defibrillator, she decided to launch the appeal.

Since then, Millie has had a device implanted in her chest which is connected to the cardiac unit at Great Ormond Street Hospital to monitor her heart activity 24 hours a day.