(KNSI) — A grandfather who suffered a heart attack while at a Sartell-Sauk Rapids varsity tennis match on May 2nd got to personally thank the people who saved his life Monday night.
Gerald Ruis thinks he remembers getting into his vehicle that night, but nothing after.
Ruis went into cardiac arrest, causing him to back into a row of cars, pinning him inside. Sean Wellander saw what happened and jumped into action, separating Ruis’s vehicle from the others, getting him down on the ground, and immediately starting CPR. Officers Bailey Ostendorf and Gabrielle Budde arrived on scene and Ostendorf used an automated external defibrillator and repeatedly shocked Ruis as his pulse flitted in and out of rhythm. Budde did chest compressions until the EMTs Josh Meskill and Jennifer Lyke were able to set up a LUCAS device to take over chest compressions, which worked for an hour until Ruis could be stabilized and transported to the hospital.
Ruis says he has no recollection of the entire next day after the incident. Ruis is grateful it wasn’t worse. Most cardiac arrest victims outside of a hospital don’t make it. Even more have to be put into what Ruis’s doctors call ‘a deep freeze.’ “They didn’t put me in an extended coma because I was able to do commands that they asked me. I did not remember that. And, so, it’s 24 hours later, they were waking me up, and that’s when I realized I was in the hospital room, and I turned to my wife and I said, ‘What the hell happened?'”
After the incident, he realized he’s not done on Earth yet. “I’m just filled with gratitude and thankful that I’ve got more life to live. Obviously, without them saving my life, things would be a whole lot different for Karen [his wife] and my family.”
Receiving the life-saving award from the Sauk Rapids City Council were Welander, officers Ostendorf and Budde, and EMTs Meskill and Lyke. Another EMT who assisted at the scene was able to join Gerald Ruis and his family for a reception afterwards.
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