A Community Organisation at the heart of the Meon Valley
We set up as a community organisation in 2001 and became a registered charity in 2020. Our objective is to help save lives by training people in emergency life saving (ELS). These skills are the actions needed to keep someone alive and safe until professional help arrives. They are skills that anyone can learn.
Life-threatening emergencies are sadly all too common. Coronary heart disease (CHD) in particular, is one of this country’s biggest killers. Although the rate is falling in the UK, it is still one of the highest in the world, accounting for more than 120,000 deaths per year.
Every two minutes one person in the UK has a heart attack, and in 30% of cases the casualty dies before he or she reaches hospital, due to cardiac arrest. Other causes of cardiac arrest include electrocution and drug overdose.
Recovery from out-of-hospital cardiac arrest is more likely if each link in what is known as the ‘chain of survival’ is strong.
The Chain of Survival
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Early Access – to get professional help quickly
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Early Cardio-Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) – to buy time
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Early Defibrillation – to restart the heart
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Early Advanced Life Support – to stabilise the patient
Watch this video of a Heart Start course that
we recently ran in Hampshire.
Music: Stayin Alive by the Bee Gees © 1977
All of our work is undertaken by volunteers who give freely of their personal time to undertake this important work. They are:
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Our trainers, all of whom have operational emergency experience and are certified to run the Heartstart courses;
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Our helpers who attend the training in a support role
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Our Committee which ensures we have the resources to do our work and are well governed.
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We offer all of our training free- of- charge to community organisations, schools, members of the public, businesses and family groups. We rely on donations to cover the costs of training materials and other costs associated with running our training courses.
We have so far trained over 20,000 people and each year we add a further 1,000 – 2,000 people to that number. Our vision is that everyone should know how to save a life.