THIS is the terrifying 999 call that a wife panickedly made after she was afraid her superfit husband would be dead next to her.
Jennifer Dunne, 40 years old, woke to Geraint making odd noises which she assumed were his snoring.
She panicked when she didn’t hear back from him and realized that he had died.
She called the Welsh Ambulance Service, explaining that she had just returned from the loo and was afraid he was dead. “doing nothing”.
This heart-stopping call was released by the service as part of a campaign that educates people about CPR.
It shows a scared Jennifer saying, “My husband, I don’t believe he’s alive.”
“I believe he’s dead next to me. I woke up, and he is making a lot of funny noises.
“And then I went to the bathroom, I came back but he has absolutely no response.
“I don’t think he’s breathing, he’s not doing anything.”
The cyclist had experienced a sudden cardiac arrest while he was asleep.
The call handler immediately told her to pull the patient off the bed and perform CPR until the ambulance arrived.
Gwen, the daughter of the couple, slept in another room while paramedics applied a defibrillator fifteen times to restart Geraint.
He was rescued from the brink and rushed to hospital. He spent a month in recovery.
Geraint said: “There are no words to say how grateful I am – not just to Jen for the CPR, but to the call handler, the ambulance crew, everyone.
“Thanks to them, I have a second chance at life.”
Cardiac arrest doesn’t mean the same thing as heart attack.
This is when your heart stops pumping suddenly. If you don’t seek medical help within minutes, you may die. It is estimated that 100,000 people die each year in the UK every year, according to the BHF.
Sudden cardiac arrest can occur quickly and without warning.
On the other hand, a heart attack occurs when blood flow to your heart is reduced.
If someone is experiencing cardiac arrest:
There are a few signs that heart attacks may present, including:
The Cardiff couple had been watching Love Island before going to bed, but in the early hours of the morning Jennifer was woken up.
She said: “I woke up to the sound of Geraint snoring, which he does now and again, so I didn’t think much of it.
“I tried to rouse him but couldn’t so just assumed he was in a deep sleep.
“It was only when I nipped to the loo and came back into the room did I realise that something was seriously wrong. That’s when I called 999.”
Call handler Stephen Meaker who picked up Jennifer’s call, saying: “As soon as Jennifer said she thought her husband had died, I knew instantly that I’d be talking her through CPR.
“She was absolutely brilliant and so calm.”
Paramedic Corey Mead (based in Blackweir) and Emergency Medical Technician Jo Sherrin (based in Blackweir) were the first to arrive at this property.
Corey said: “It’s very rare that a 39-year-old has a cardiac arrest, so when we got allocated the call, we knew it was serious.
“We worked on him for about an hour and 40 minutes all told.
“I think lady luck played a huge part – if Geraint’s wife had not woken up in the first place, it’d be a completely different story.”
Only for hands CPR
Rescue breaths and CPR
Doctors suspect it was myocarditis which led to Geraint’s cardiac arrest in mid-August, which is an inflammation of the heart muscle caused by a virus.
Since then, he has been fitted with an implantable cardioverter alarmator (ICD), which sends electric pulses to regulate irregular heart rhythms.
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