BHS emergency team saves life of coworker after cardiac arrest

On Dec. 13 a team of coworkers and health professionals saved the life of an employee who had collapsed with cardiac arrest at Belleville High School.
At the Jan. 17 meeting of the Van Buren Public Schools Board of Education, Dionisia Munoz, district resource nurse, explained what happened.
She said as district nurse she cannot be at all eight district buildings at the same time, so she has trained Emergency Medical Response Teams (EMRTs) in each building. She said she meets with them once a month for ongoing training for specific emergencies.
She said she earned the credentials and can certify individuals in cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and operation of an automated external defibrillator (AED). She said McBride Middle School is the only building where all team members are certified.
McBride has been recognized as being Michigan Heart Safe, a prestigious award. They have a banner hanging in the school office. She said her goal is to have all the schools be on the state register as Heart Safe.
Then Munoz told the story of what happened on Dec. 13 when she was with bus drivers at the bus garage teaching them what to do if a student had a seizure on the bus.
She said got a cell phone call at 9:20 a.m. from a custodian, saying, “We need you.” An employee had a cardiac arrest. She asked if they had called 911, as trained, and they had. She said she rushed over, abruptly leaving the bus drivers.
Munoz said three security guards guided her to the proper door at the high school and it was propped open for her. She said Brian Roberson and Scott Wilsey were doing CPR. Others were there, including Steve Jones. She said some of the helpers were not on the EMRT.
Scott had hooked up the AED and they had already shocked him before she got there. She said she did one round of CPR and the AED did not advise a second shock. HVA took him to the hospital and he’s fine now, she said.
She said the team had alerted the family and put the school on hold, as trained. She said the HVA and fire department didn’t have to navigate students in the hall and HVA called the school later to say what a good job they did.
“You saved a life,” said school board president Amy Pearce. “That’s not an exaggeration at all.”
Munoz said there are four EMRT teams at BHS. She said on Dec. 2, one of the AEDs mounted in a hall at BHS was beeping and it was reported to her. She said she changed the battery, but it started beeping again.
She said she found an extra new AED unit at the Administration Building, so they replaced the beeping unit with the good one. She said that’s the AED that was used on the cardiac arrest patient.
John Leroy, human resources director, said, “Students are safer here than at home, in some cases.”
School Supt. Pete Kudlak said Munoz had helped the district through COVID and has been available to help with health questions and other needs. The formation of the EMRTs is very important to the safety of the schools, he said.
“She’s very humble,” Supt. Kudlak said.