“It’s your lucky day,” a nurse told Ray Nichol after the 70-year-old collapsed at a sports stadium.
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It might not seem particularly fortunate for your heart to suddenly stop beating.
But the more the Bendigo and District Table Tennis Association member and his family have learnt about that day, they greater their appreciation of his good luck.
Ray was about two metres from a defibrillator when he collapsed at the stadium shared by the table tennis association and Eaglehawk and Bendigo Badminton Association, on November 30.
A fellow table tennis player, Keith Parker, immediately started performing CPR.
He was assisted by an an off-duty doctor, Berenika Turchin, who works in the Bendigo Health emergency department.
Meanwhile, onlookers called for an ambulance.
Fellow table tennis association member Michael Bissett administered a single shock of the defibrillator while the crowd waited for paramedics to arrive.
In training, Michael said he had been warned some people might not respond to the device immediately.
So it was much to his surprise when Ray sprang back to life almost instantaneously.
“I just woke up feeling fine,” Ray said.
“The only soreness I had afterwards was from the CPR.”
He spent six days in intensive care at Bendigo Health and St John of God Bendigo Hospital, where it was discovered heart arrhythmia was the cause of his collapse.
Ray now has a miniature defibrillator and pacemaker in his chest – on his right-hand side, so it won’t interfere with the left-hander’s table tennis form.
He said he and his family were “incredibly grateful” to all who had helped in his time of need.
Table tennis association president Gary Warnest was proud of the organisation’s members, and glad there was a defibrillator at the venue.
It was with the help of Empowering Eaglehawk, St John’s Ambulance Victoria and the badminton association that the device was installed, in May 2013.
Gary said he believed defibrillators should be installed at all venues, and had told Table Tennis Victoria as much since Ray’s collapse.
Empowering Eaglehawk has been involved in the installation of about seven defibrillators in Eaglehawk.