AOA Recommends Automated External Defibrillators to Schools

Concerned about the protection of young sports enthusiasts, participants in the United States of America Osteopathic Association's (AOA) House of Delegates voted today to actually encourage educational environments to have quickly obtainable automated external defibrillators (AEDs).

The vast majority of cases of commotio cordis” an abrupt cardiac event happening after a blow towards the chest” happen during youth or high school competitive sporting events, an example would be baseball or football. AEDs could help save lives, despite the fact that waiting for emergency team members to arrive in the area.

"Sadly, there is certainly only a 15% survival rate given by a commotio cordis event due to absence of early recognition of the intensity of the problem," says Stanley E. Grogg, DO, an AOA board-certified pediatrician and an associate dean of clinical research as well as a professor of pediatrics at the Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences College of Osteopathic Medicine in Tulsa. "The availability of an automated external defibrillator at educational environments and sporting events can buy younger athletes life until medical experts come in the area."

Currently, 13 states, along with Illinois, have legislation that requires schools to possess these devices. Five states have pending regulations and three states have legislation "sympathetic" schools to end up with AED.