Our President Sarah welcomed us and our guests Cathy Winter, our WI Advisor, and our speaker for the evening, Ellie Monger, who lectures to nurses at Southampton University Hospital.
Ellie had come to talk to us in connection with our resolution this year “ Bystanders can be Lifesavers”. She started by explaining the difference between a heart attack and a cardiac arrest. In both cases it was vital to call an ambulance by dialling 999 or the international number for getting help 112.
In the case of a heart attack the patient may be conscious and would be breathing and apart from putting them in the recovery position no further intervention would usually be necessary.
The situation with a cardiac arrest was very different when the patient would have stopped breathing and intervention is vital. Once it has been established without doubt that this is the case CPR can start. The effectiveness of this can be best illustrated by the fact that thirty five percent of patients suffering a cardiac arrest in hospital survive compared to less than ten percent in the community. Ellie stressed that it was very important to do something because you cannot make the situation any worse and it was vital to keep oxygen flowing to the brain. However you should be careful not to put yourself in any danger.
Ellie then demonstrated the technique of CPR on models of an adult, a child and a baby. She also showed us how to do mouth to mouth resuscitation.
Finally she demonstrated how to use a defibrillator opening the box and showing us where the pads should go on all three models she had brought with her. We were reassured by the clear instructions provided by the machine. Ellie stressed that it was important to keep clear once the machine was turned on.
We noted that defibrillators are positioned locally at the Crown, the Village Hall and at Ashley, Rookley and Eldon Farms. It was considered a good idea if these locations could be highlighted in a special notice in a future edition of the Gauntlet.
Ellie delivered all this information very clearly and with humour and answered all our questions as we went along. Everyone felt that this had been one of our most worthwhile meetings and felt that if Ellie was willing, another open meeting on the subject should be arranged. Thanks to Ellie we now thought that “ Bystanders could be Lifesavers!”
After a break for tea and coffee our AGM started with reports from Linda on the last year’s events which had been very varied. Tina, our Treasurer was able to show a very healthy set of accounts. Sarah then thanked all the members for their contribution to the smooth running of a very enjoyable year in the life of our branch.
Cathy then reported on one or two minor amendments to the WI Constitution before conducting the election of officers for the coming year. We were very pleased that Sarah was re-elected as President, Linda as Secretary and Tina as Treasurer. All the committee members were also re-elected.
We were all looking forward to the programme of events for the coming year starting with our next meeting when Maureen Leveson will talk to us about the work of Associated Country Women of the World, our WI Charity. This meeting will take place on 11th June. Guests are always welcome.
Eileen Reynolds
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