Carroll hopes to be among the first counties in the state with devices in every school that can jump-start students? and teachers? stopped hearts.
Steven Krouse, a physical education teacher at Cranberry Station Elementary School in Westminster, has partnered with a private, nonprofit organization, the Carroll County Public Schools Education Foundation, to try to raise $64,000 to buy defibrillators for the county?s 31 elementary and middle schools.
“I?ve had students who?ve had serious heart conditions in my school and it was always a worry to me,” Krouse said. “If something happened, would we be able to take care of it?”
High schools in Maryland are required to have defibrillators under a state law passed in 2006 to make sports safer. But the school systems in Carroll and most other counties at the time decided against buying the machines for every school, said Steve Guthrie, the county?s assistant superintendent.
“You?re finding them show up in malls, they?re in health clubs, they?re in airports. They?re trying to get them everywhere because they?re so easy to use,” Krouse said. “So why not put them in schools?”
The devices detect victims? heart rhythms, then talk to users to tell them where to put the color-coded pads and when to press the button to jolt the victim?s heart into the correct beat.
More than 300 students and staff with heart conditions are registered with the county schools system, Krouse said. According to the American Heart Association, most recent statistics show that in 2004 about 310,000 Americans died from out-of-hospital cardiac arrests.
But victims? chances of surviving improve about 70 percent when a defibrillator is used instead of CPR, Krouse said.
Baltimore is the only metropolitan county with defibrillators in all schools, Krouse said. Anne Arundel has them in all middle and high schools, a spokesman said.
Nancy McCormick, who serves on the Education Foundation?s board, said the group is reviewing its finances to determine if it has enough money to pay for all the defibrillators.
