Selfless Act Leads to Rescue in Sarasota
May 13, 2016From the LongBoat Key Observer
It was a dear, sunshine-filled Florida day, when Jim Allan decided to go for a bike ride. He began mid-morning on his normal route, from his Bird Key home up to the northern tip of Longboat Key, about 25 miles round trip. Nearing the end of his ride on his way home, he started up the incline of the New Pass Bridge. It% the last thing he remembers about Feb. 19. At about the same time Allan strapped on his helmet for his ride that morning, Suzanne Dubose began her run from Marina Jack parking lot A registered nurse at Doctors Hospital of Sarasota, Dubose has always been big on fitness, and was training for the Sarasota Marathon March 4. Skipping church to get some miles in, she planned to run to Ken Thompson Park on City Island and back. Feeling good that morning, after she made it to the park, Dubose decided to push a little farther north before turning around to start her run back. She turned the corner of Ken Thompson Parkway, when she saw someone lying on the ground on the west side of the New Pass Bridge. Seeing three anglers on the bridge rushing to help, she ran toward what appeared to be a fallen bi-cyclist on the side of the road. Luckily, one of the anglers had a cell phone and dialed 944.
She put her fingers to the fallen bicyclist’s neck trying to find a pulse in the carotid artery. Nothing. She then reached for his wrist when she realized she wasn’t thinking clearly: If his neck didn’t have a pulse, his wrist certainly wouldn’t have one. It was then, looking down at Allan, with a bloodied face from breaking teeth in the fall from his bare, that she realized he would need CPR.
It was Gary Jodat wife’s birthday. The couple was in the car on Longboat Key, heading down to Boca Grande to celebrate. As Jodat, a local attorney, drove south over the rise of the New Pass Bridge, he noticed a group of people gathered on the right side of the road, in the shoulder between the white line and the bridge’s concrete barrier. “Do you think we should stop?” Jodat asked his wife, who told him to stop and help. He pulled his Jeep to the side of the road on the south end of the bridge, walked up the incline and saw Dubose checking Al-lan for a pulse. As a former volunteer firefighter 25 years ago in Seekonk, Mass., Jodat told Dubose he would do the compressions while she did the breathing. Braving the risk that confronted her with the exposure of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, Dubose asked the anglers for some-thing to wipe Allan§ face off. One of them took off his shirt and handed it to her. Us-ing the shirt to pinch Allan’s nose, Dubose worked to push air into his lungs, as Jodat alternated the cycle of compressions. Within a few cycles of CPR, the ambulance arrived and EMTs loaded Allan up. Although it happened quickly, a crowd of people emerged to help, including a man who lived nearby, offering everyone water and the use of his home to dean off The emergency vehicles left, and Jodat got back into the car with his wife. Realizing there was nothing more they could do, they decided to continue with their plans to go to Boca Grande.
After getting cleaned up, Dubose’s worry shifted from Allan to herself As a single mother with a 5-year-old at home, she be-gan to think about the risk she had just taken. isetore she began CPR She had looked at his expensive bite and his riding clothes, and realized they meant nothing; they couldn’t tell her whether he was healthy or not. She got so caught up, she forgot to ask for a ride, so she began the long run back to the Marina Jack parking lot .
Later in the afternoon, both Jodat and Dubose received calls that Allan was alive. He had suffered a major heart attack “At the time of the incident, we didn’t know what was wrong with him; Dubose said “We thought at first that he fell off his bike or was hit by a car.” Dubose said when she first saw him, she remembered being glad to see that he was obviously active and in good shape. ‘He had a lot of good things going for him,’ Dubose said. ‘It wasn’t just us around him, either, there were a lot of people who helped him that day’ According to the doctors at Sarasota Memorial Hospital, the best things Allan had going for him were Jodat and Dubose. After Allan awoke on Thursday from being heavily sedated the previous two days, the doctors told him anyone whose heart stops outside a hospital has about a 3% chance of. survival. Without receiving CPR when he did, Allan most likely would have died, or at best, sustained brain and/or heart damage.
The Sarasota Bay Rotary Club, to which Allan belongs as a banker with RBC Centura, honored Jodat and Dubose with plaques April 11 for saving Allan’s life. Nearly two months later, Allan is alive and well, yet Dubose still has mixed feelings about the event. “I got a lot of grief from my friends at the hospital for what I did” Dubose said All I can say is that I was there and I did what I had to do. I’m glad it was a happy ending. If anything, kb ben a learning experience; I now have a (CPR shield) with me wherever I go. I bought a bunch of them and even handed them out to my friends.’ Both Dubose and Jodat said the event has made them realize the importance of receiving and staying current on CPR training. -Although we use an ambu bag (a resuscitation device) in the hospital, I know how to do CPR, and I was like a deer in the headlights for a moment,’ Dubose said “Its important to stay current and practice and carry a face (shield) with you. You just never know when you’re going to need it.” The best birthday During the remainder of the drive to Boca Grande on Feb. 19, the Jodats tried to look forward to their trip. When they learned of Allan condition after their arrival, Lisa Jodat said something that shocked her husband. “She said this birthday was the best day of her life,” Jodat said. For Allan, it may not have been the best day, but it was certainly his luckiest “Its kind of a miracle these two people happened to be there,” Allan said. Without them, I probably wouldn’t be here.
Source: https://issuu.com/timhas/docs/gary_jodat
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