The Conversation
Meet The Dispatcher Who Saved Two Lives In An Hour!
Most of us will never have the opportunity to save a life. So the fact that a 21-year old 9-1-1 dispatcher in Flagler County, FL, saved two lives in the space of an hour is pretty astounding!
McKenzie Davis was recently working her regular 12-hour shift, when, around 3:30 in the afternoon, she answered a call from a mother, frantic because her 6-month old child wasn't breathing.
Davis calmed the mom down, then walked her through the process of performing CPR on the baby, even counting over the phone to make sure the mother was doing chest compressions at the right speed. "It's all in the tone of your voice," Davis told News4Jax.com. "If you're calm they're calm." After one round of CPR, the baby started breathing again.
An hour after helping save a baby, Davis' adrenaline was still pumping when a call came in that a 71-year old man was in his backyard pool, not breathing.
She made sure the family had the man out of the pool, then once again she had the caller put the phone on speaker, and coached the family (none of whom was trained in CPR) as they took turns doing compresssions. A deputy who was first on the scene took over CPR, and when paramedics arrived, the man had a strong pulse.
Barbara Mulvey calls her husband's savior an "angel."
"Everyone has their thing they can do. That's hers, and she should not give it up!"
For Davis it was great to know that both patients are going to be fine. "It was a relief because obviously not all the time is a positive outcome," Davis told . "It was a relief to find out they did make it."
Just about a month earlier, Davis answered a 9-1-1 call from a mother with an 18-month year old daughter who was having a seizure and stopped breathing. Davis' CPR instructions and live compression counting allowed the parents to get their baby.
"9-1-1 is the number you call in your darkest hour . She did a phenomenal job," Sheriff Rick Staly told the Daytona Beach News Journal. "Our dispatchers are our lifeline to the community. To do back-to-back lifesaving events is testament to her ability as a dispatcher and a prime example of what our dispatchers do day in and day out."
