Post date: Mar 22, 2013 12:13:27 PM
A Perth man who saved a toddler by mouth-to-mouth resuscitation talks about the ordeal and is thanked by her parents.
PERTH, AUSTRALIA (MARCH 17, 2013) (SEVEN NETWORK) - An Australian builder has been hailed a hero for saving the life of a toddler when she stopped breathing in a supermarket.
Security camera footage shows the events unfolding in Perth, Western Australia, as Amy Collard realises her two-year-old daughter Shaylar is not breathing."All of a sudden this lady came running out screaming, 'Help my baby, help my baby, she's not breathing," Rowan O'Neill, who had been shopping at the supermarket, told Seven Network's Today Tonight programme.
Collard approached a checkout lane to ask other customers, including local tradesman O'Neill, for help before rushing outside to get Shaylar's father, Michael Narkle.
O'Neill examined the girl, thinking she was choking and turned her upside down.
As staff called for help, Narkle rushed into the store in a panic.
O'Neill and Narkle tried reviving Shaylar by turning her upside down, shaking her, patting her on the back and employing the Heimlich manoeuvre.
"We thought she was choking so we were just trying to get what ever she was choking on out of her mouth. I don't even know what to think about it, I just thank God that
she's okay. It could have been a situation that went the other way and luckily in this case it didn't," O'Neill said.
After trying to revive her without success O'Neill began mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Ninety seconds later the girl opened her eyes, local media said.
O'Neill said his first feeling was of relief.
"But at the same time you're still a bit scared that you know you're not out of the woods yet so you have just got to keep doing with what you're doing," he said.
Shaylar's parents had a chance to meet O'Neill two days later to thank him.
Collard said she had panicked.
"I've just had a caesarean and I had to like quickly try and run but I couldn't so I left her on the counter and I panicked myself and had to get my partner in," she said.
"I thought she'd die on me, yes, so I'd never see her again," Narkle added.
Local TV stations said doctors thought Shaylar had a fever which caused her to pass out. She was back at home after one night in hospital.