Runner collapses, suffers cardiac arrest at half-marathon that raises funds for Heart and Stroke Foundation

The man in charge of the WFPS half-marathon had to put his years of paramedic experience touse after a runner collapsed just after the finish line on Sunday.

Race director Jonathan Torchia, who had worked as a paramedic for 13 years before becoming a business owner, says he was metres away when it happened.

In that moment, Torchia says he went from race director to paramedic as he and volunteers sprang into action, grabbing anautomated external defibrillator (AED)and doing chest compressions.

"It was tough and I kind of went numb there for a second," he said.

"I just reminded myself, I know what I have to do here to help this guy out."

At first, the prognosis was not good, Torchia said. The man had gone totally limp, and Torchia says he couldn't find a pulse on his carotid artery.

Fortunately, the man regained consciousness after the AED was applied and he was taken to hospital, Torchia said.

"What could have been a very terrible, sad, heartbreaking disaster had a positive outcome," Torchia said.

"In my career as a paramedic I saw, I would say, 90 per cent go the other way, where you're doing chest compressions and trying to shock the person and get everything back and it doesn't happen."

A spokesperson for the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service said they transported one individual in unstable condition from the event, but couldn't comment further due to privacy legislation.

'Angel watching over him'

Torchia said the man was lucky that it happened when and where it did. If he had collapsed along the race, there likely wouldn't have been anyone there to do first aid and deploy a defibrillator.

"I told him he has an angel watching over him. He went down at the right spot at the right time," he said.

Torchia said he visited the man in hospital and he appears to be in good spirits, despite the close call.

"He hasn't quite processed what happened. He almost can't believe that's what happened."

He added that it's fitting that this year's half-marathon raised money for the Heart andStroke Foundation.

"What a story for that kind of thing to happen right at our event," he said."It's a really good reminder that this can happen to anybody."

There are roughly 60,000 cardiac arrests outside hospitals in Canada every year or one every nine minutes, said Andrew Lotto, a senior manager at theHeart andStroke Foundation.

"And the thing that's probably more shocking to people is that more than half of those, ornearly half of those,happened to people under the age of 65.So the statistics are that this isn't as uncommon as we might think."

A report released earlier this year by the foundation, says onlyone in 10 peoplewho experience an out-of-hospital cardiac arrestsurvives, so theactions of a bystander can mean the difference between life and death.

Immediate CPR keeps the blood pumping to keep the brain and other vital organs alive, and an AED will shock the heart to help it restart. Without those life-saving measures, a person's survival drops significantly with every passing minute, says the report,Every Second Counts: Transforming Resuscitation to Restart More Hearts.

"I want to congratulate the WFPS Run organizers for prioritizing health and safety of all the run participants. They had an AED on site and they had people trained in CPR to know what to do," Lotto said.

"It's both fortuitous and a little bit ironic, maybe we can say, that this happened at a Heart and Stroke fundraising event. But I think what's really important is to recognize that those fast actions make all the difference, and this person is alive today because people recognized the signs of a cardiac arrest."

Winnipeg race director leans on paramedic background to help save runner's life

8 days ago

Duration 5:38

The man in charge of the WFPS half-marathon had to put his years of paramedic experience to use after a runner collapsed just after the finish line on Sunday. Race director Jonathan Torchia, who worked as a paramedic for 13 years before becoming a business owner, says he was metres away when it happened.