News Item – Drones could speed deployment of emergency defibrillators: Canadian study

A drone network could be deployed to speed defibrillators to bystanders trying to help people in cardiac arrest, getting the devices to the patient faster than emergency services, a recent Canadian study suggests.

Researchers examined historical data on 53,702 cardiac arrests over 26,851 square kilometers (10,367 square miles) of rural and urban regions surrounding Toronto, Ontario, to see how drones might be deployed to get help to cardiac arrest patients more quickly than typical 911 response times.

If drones were spread evenly across the region, researchers calculated that it would require 37 drones spread across 23 bases to get patients started on defibrillator treatment about one minute faster than they would have been if they waited for emergency services.

Full article at: Globe and Mail