Bransgore Community First Responders and Heartstart Bransgore New Forest have marked 11 defibrillators with SelectaDNA, a forensic marking product. That will enable the police to identify where the public access defibrillators have come from if they are stolen and recovered.
The defibrillators are housed in distinctive yellow cabinets and are ready to be used in cases of cardiac arrest. Local residents are within eight minutes reach of this vital piece of equipment.
Community First Responders are volunteers who are trained to attend emergency calls received by the ambulance service and provide care until the ambulance arrives. Other equipment carried on the emergency call outs is also being marked with SelectaDNA and registered to the national, police approved database.
Mike Jukes, Group Co-ordinator Bransgore Community First Responders said: “Although there has not been any problem with theft, it was considered prudent to take steps to permanently, yet discreetly, mark the defibrillators in such a way that they could be identified if stolen and later recovered by police.”
In 2016, the team attended several hundred emergency calls and were available ‘on-call’ for over 7,000 hours, which equates to over 81pc of every day averaged across the year.
Mike Jukes added: “The potential for our team to arrive on scene before an ambulance, especially in rural areas, is vital in providing immediate life-saving treatment. Helping patients at a critical time is our primary role and we need to be confident that the equipment, including public access defibrillators, is there and ready to use when we need it.”
