Michael Skuce pictured along with Bridget McAnallen (The Cormac Trust) and Anna Corrigan at the special night in Derrygonnelly Community Hall
THE woman whose life was saved by a defibrillator after suffering cardiac arrest, has spoken for the first time since that traumatic night 18 months ago.
The date was December 23, 2012, the venue; Derrygonnelly Community Centre, where country singer Johnny Brady was holding a concert.
It was just any other night for married mother-of-three Anna Corrigan from Derrygonnelly before she suddenly collapsed, suffering cardiac arrest.
“I don’t remember anything about it, I actually lost a week of memory, explained Anna, a biomedical scientist at the South West Acute Hospital in Enniskillen.
“That was Sunday night and I don’t remember anything really from the Friday before it to the Friday after it. I lost a week, but I think it’s probably a good thing not to have memory of it.”
She continued: “I’m very lucky two people were there, one was a paramedic, the other was a nurse and they began CPR straight away.
“They initiated the people to get the defibrillator and the paramedic assessed the situation right away and knew it was cardiac arrest.
“They started the CPR and that’s why I made such a good recovery, I don’t have any side effects at all after basically being clinically dead for 20/25 minutes.”
Anna was first brought into the hospital in Enniskillen before being moved on to Altnagelvin on December 26 where an angiogram was performed.
This showed a slight narrowing of one of her coronary arteries. A stent was put in, but to ensure no repeat of cardiac arrest in the future Anna was transferred to the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast and a mini defibrillator was fitted under the muscle in her chest wall.
The wires from the defibrillator go into the heart and if she ever goes into cardiac arrest again the defibrillator will kick in and restart the heart.
Anna will forever be indebted to the local people who used the defibrillator from Derrygonnelly GAA club to save her life.
She was the first person to use that piece of equipment and Anna admits where it not for its intervention she would not be alive today.
“Oh yes definitely. I think that night it actually took the ambulance quite a while to get out.
“They had been going to an accident and were diverted and I think it could have taken upwards of 40 minutes to get out and that could have been too late.
“It really was the difference between life and death.
“With these defibrillators now situated in these rural areas and as it is so remote, with the bad mobile phone coverage, they’re vital.”
She added: “There’s also the cross-community element in the group, which is fantastic.
“I’ve met more people in Springfield, Monea and the other areas that I never knew before, it really is brilliant. So much good has come out of what happened.”
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