When Edward Morris collapsed into cardiac arrest on Noosa Main Beach last year, his wife Brooke was terrified to tell their children their father wouldn’t make it home.
Edward and Brooke, from South Australia, were on holiday in Noosa and enjoying a swim in the ocean on a balmy February afternoon. Edward was just exiting the water when he waved at Brooke before he collapsed onto the sand and became unresponsive.
Volunteer Nippers were training nearby and witnessed the incident, jumping into action to begin effective compressions on Edward while lifeguards from the Noosa Surf Club grabbed their Automated External Defibrillator (AED).
Meanwhile, a bystander had phoned Triple Zero (000).
Paramedics Karina Hyland, Tayla Riley, Toby Sutter, Peter Walsh and Jeffrey Bradfield arrived on scene and continued the resuscitation measures on Edward, which included a total of 16 shocks from the defibrillator to achieve return of spontaneous circulation for Edward’s heart.
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Tewantin paramedics reconnect with patient Edward Morris and his wife Brooke and Tewantin Officer in Charge (OIC) Joanne Lawson. | ||
They transported Edward to the Sunshine Coast University Hospital (SCUH) in a critical condition, where Brooke remained by his side.
Doctors needed to perform an angioplasty on Edward, who was critically unstable, and Brooke was told to expect the worst.
“They said they were going to attempt surgery and I was told he may not survive,” Brooke said.
“However, I was told without the surgery, he wouldn’t survive anyway.”
Thankfully for Edward and Brooke the surgery was successful, and after a month in hospital he was able to return home to his family.
During Edward’s recovery he learned to walk again, and how to live with a brain injury.Without the early intervention from those on scene his outcome would have been dramatically worse.
Edward and Brooke made the decision to return to Noosa in September this year to make some happier memories and to meet the people who helped saved his life.
After visiting his nurses and doctors at SCUH, the pair made their way back to Noosa Heads to catch up with the crew from Noosa Surf Club and some of the paramedics involved in his incident.
Brooke and Edward drew emotional responses in one of QAS’s senior paramedics when passing on their thanks.
Jeffrey said he held back tears after hearing Brooke and Edwards daughters passed along their thanks for saving their dad so he could walk them down the aisle for their wedding days.
“Being a father myself I was very touched, and slightly emotional, by the words that Ed’s daughters had to say about how grateful they were to the entire team in helping save their dad’s life,” Jeffrey said.
“It was fantastic to see how well Ed was doing, and to see how grateful his wife and family were, considering how critically ill he was that day.
“I couldn’t help but reflect on how well everyone had worked as a team to get such a great patient outcome.
“It certainly goes to show how important the chain of survival really is. Considering the amount of times Ed was defibrillated by both lifeguards and QAS, I would consider his outcome both rare and quite miraculous.”