Meeting Notes, February 11, 2020

President Lynn King called the meeting to order at 8:00 
Kevin Courtney offered the prayer and led the pledge to the flag

 

Announcements:

Auction- Friday (2/14) is filming for the sponsors (there is one full sponsorship left), Saturday (2/15) is taping of the auction at WTOC, Sunday (2/23) is the televised auction and viewing party at Reilley's South End.  Kristin Kelly reported that so far items turned in total $106,000 with close to 200 items.  She also reports that "text to bid" worked well as she used it at the Heart Ball.  All items to be on TV had to be in this week.  We will accept donated items next week - they won't be on TV but can be listed on the website.

 

March 22 is the meal packing project for local Rotary clubs.  There will be a Bluffton location as well as a location on Hilton Head Island.  More information will follow, but save the date.  We have contributed money to this event but do need hands on man power to pack the food.

 

Treasurer John Farrenkopf reported that you can now pay your dues using Zelle. He sent out an email with more information. 

 

Sergeant at Arms Julie Camp Tome welcomed visiting Rotarians and collected Happy $$.  Visiting Rotarians:  Larry Carlson (Illinois), Blain Anderson (Kentucky) and Harvey Flashing (Kennebunkport)

 

Speaker:

 

Tom Bouthillet, Town of Hilton Head Island EMS Director spoke about how HHI EMS responds to cardiac arrest calls.  Sudden cardiac arrest is a completely unexpected event and is unlike an end of life occurrence which may be expected.  He spoke of the need for quick response, the outstanding record that HHI EMS has and the constant striving for improvement that takes place.  Sudden cardiac arrest is a death sentence in much of the world.  Our EMS has had sustainable performance in this area for the past five years, having an excellent record of saving lives. One of the most important factors in saving lives is if someone observed the collapse and is able to call 911. Industries that are successful in saving lives of sudden cardiac victims are studied and their procedures are simulated.

Every single person before going into the field is trained in high perforance CPR, chest compression, shocking,etc.  It was found that transfer times are dangerous times. Now they use a checklist to follow, before as well as when they get a pulse back.  For 2020 they are reviewing 911 recordings to put a new training program together - continuous quality improvement.  There is also an app - pulse point responder. If you are within a half mile radius it notifies you in hopes of improving bystander CPR to help with response time.  There are 215 defibrilators in the area. Almost all gated community security carry defibrilators and are trained in CPR.  He showed pictures of some survivors and their stories, one being a man who was running in the Firecracker 500 5K race and was lucky enough to have a nurse running nearby who was able to offer immediate assistance.  Tom indicated that hands only CPR, chest compressions are adequate to do until EMS arrives.  Living on Hilton Head Island we are very fortunate to have EMS services which are not only high performance quality consistently, but are constantly being improved.