Bangor physician stresses importance of quick action following cardiac arrest

BANGOR, Maine (WABI) - As of Tuesday evening, Buffalo Bills player Damar Hamlin remains in critical condition at a Cincinnati hospital after suffering a cardiac arrest during an NFL game Monday night.

TV5 spoke to a local doctor today to get more insight into what happened.

Physician Andrew Ehrhard is the medical director for Northern Light Eastern Maine Medical Center’s emergency department.

He says roughly 350,000 people suffer cardiac arrest outside of the hospital in the United States each year. He says about 90% of them will die either before getting to the hospital or before they can be discharged from the hospital.

According to Ehrhard, quality CPR administered in a timely fashion can make all the difference.

“One of the reasons that those statistics are so abysmal is less than half of people get CPR by a bystander. And so, the sooner you can start CPR, the better the patient’s chances are surviving. And the same thing goes with the AED,” said Ehrhard.

According to Fox 19 in Cincinnati, both CPR and an AED were used on Hamlin on the field Monday night.

Dr. Ehrhard encourages everyone to take a CPR class, like the ones offered by the American Red Cross.

He also advocates for more businesses obtaining AED devices.

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