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Police officer brings man back to life
By George Derringer
Thursday, January 6, 2005
Candace Doyle has been a Swampscott police officer for only three years but her career already has the very best kind of highlight: she brought a 56-year-old Swampscott man back to life in dramatic fashion Monday afternoon.
"We got a call from the MBTA at 3:59 p.m., saying a man was down on the platform, the Boston-bound platform, having a seizure," Doyle related only 30 minutes after the incident. "A bystander who had seen the problem got off the train and began administering CPR."
Doyle was on patrol on Essex Street, near The Greenway, when the call echoed through police radios. She and Sgt. Joe Kable, who was in a different vehicle, flipped on the sirens and raced to the train station.
"We got there at the same time," Doyle said. "I grabbed the defibrillator - there's one in every police cruiser - and we both went running."
And despite the efforts of the CPR-trained volunteer, a Boston resident who happened to be commuting to the North Shore at the time, the victim had no pulse that either he or the police officers could find.
"He was, well, basically gone," Doyle said. "We immediately hooked up the defibrillator."
She described how one terminal is attached above a victim's breastbone and the other to a person's side.
"The idea is to send a shock right through the heart and get it going again," she said. "We've all been trained in this but this is the first time I've had to actually use it."
Doyle, a Pittsfield native who worked for the police department in her home city for a few months before transferring to Swampscott, wasn't quite prepared for what happened next. Officer Mike Serino was also on scene to assist.
"As soon as we attached the terminals, the machine told us, 'No pulse. Administer shock,'" she said. "So I did. But we still couldn't find a pulse and the directions said the next thing was to administer CPR for one minute before trying the defibrillator again."
Doyle said it seemed like a long time but it might not have been.
"Then we found a pulse," she said with a smile. "We administered oxygen and the man started to make noises. Then I asked him if he could hear me."
He could.
"Do you know where you are?" Doyle asked. The man said he was at the Swampscott train station. Then he knew his name and who to contact.
"I realized then he was conscious and alert and even oriented," Doyle said. "But remember, without the bystander, without the defibrillator, without the other officers' encouragement, well, it would have been a different story."
Still, she said after trying to contact the victim or his family Tuesday morning, "It's good, it's rewarding to know you saved someone's life."
Police Chief Ron Madigan, standing silently by for the second half of Doyle's interview, smiled broadly, said defibrillators, provided through a grant from the state Executive Office of Public Safety, have been a great help.
"I think we were among the first towns to have them on every public safety vehicle and every officer trains on them. Now you know why," Madigan said
By George Derringer
Thursday, January 6, 2005
Candace Doyle has been a Swampscott police officer for only three years but her career already has the very best kind of highlight: she brought a 56-year-old Swampscott man back to life in dramatic fashion Monday afternoon.
"We got a call from the MBTA at 3:59 p.m., saying a man was down on the platform, the Boston-bound platform, having a seizure," Doyle related only 30 minutes after the incident. "A bystander who had seen the problem got off the train and began administering CPR."
Doyle was on patrol on Essex Street, near The Greenway, when the call echoed through police radios. She and Sgt. Joe Kable, who was in a different vehicle, flipped on the sirens and raced to the train station.
"We got there at the same time," Doyle said. "I grabbed the defibrillator - there's one in every police cruiser - and we both went running."
And despite the efforts of the CPR-trained volunteer, a Boston resident who happened to be commuting to the North Shore at the time, the victim had no pulse that either he or the police officers could find.
"He was, well, basically gone," Doyle said. "We immediately hooked up the defibrillator."
She described how one terminal is attached above a victim's breastbone and the other to a person's side.
"The idea is to send a shock right through the heart and get it going again," she said. "We've all been trained in this but this is the first time I've had to actually use it."
Doyle, a Pittsfield native who worked for the police department in her home city for a few months before transferring to Swampscott, wasn't quite prepared for what happened next. Officer Mike Serino was also on scene to assist.
"As soon as we attached the terminals, the machine told us, 'No pulse. Administer shock,'" she said. "So I did. But we still couldn't find a pulse and the directions said the next thing was to administer CPR for one minute before trying the defibrillator again."
Doyle said it seemed like a long time but it might not have been.
"Then we found a pulse," she said with a smile. "We administered oxygen and the man started to make noises. Then I asked him if he could hear me."
He could.
"Do you know where you are?" Doyle asked. The man said he was at the Swampscott train station. Then he knew his name and who to contact.
"I realized then he was conscious and alert and even oriented," Doyle said. "But remember, without the bystander, without the defibrillator, without the other officers' encouragement, well, it would have been a different story."
Still, she said after trying to contact the victim or his family Tuesday morning, "It's good, it's rewarding to know you saved someone's life."
Police Chief Ron Madigan, standing silently by for the second half of Doyle's interview, smiled broadly, said defibrillators, provided through a grant from the state Executive Office of Public Safety, have been a great help.
"I think we were among the first towns to have them on every public safety vehicle and every officer trains on them. Now you know why," Madigan said
