Philips HEARTSTART AED Defibrillator Review

By John J. Teng, P.E.

Despite the misconception that heart disease is most commonly a “man’s disease,” heart disease does not discriminate between genders, as the Centers for Disease Control (CDC0 reports that heart disease is also the leading cause of death for women in the United States, killing 289,758 women during 2013 which comes out to a about 1 in every 4 female deaths.[1]

Maybe it’s because now I’m a middle-age man that I am becoming more aware of people around my age who are suffering and even dying from sudden “out of the blue” heart attacks that I became more interested in considering having a portable AED unit that I could keep in my home and could even take with me and my family on a trip in the event that someone needed the help.

AED is an acronym that stands for “Automated External Defibrillator.”  The American Heart Association describes the purpose for this lightweight, portable device as the ability to deliver an electric shock through the chest to the heart. The shock can potentially stop an irregular heart beat (arrhythmia) and allow a normal rhythm to resume following sudden cardiac arrest (SCA).[2]

One day I thought to myself, if AED’s are important enough to be made publicly available in places like commercial office buildings, shopping malls, and even on school campuses, then why shouldn’t I be considering having one of these devices readily available in my own home where I spend just as much time if not more than when I’m in a public setting?  So I bought one.    And in the following link you can watch a short video by the American Red Cross discuss the proper use of an AED.

Using an AED by American Red Cross

You can call me overly cautious, but the way I look at it is, owning a defibrillator this is a relatively small investment to make for a potentially huge return on investment if it could potentially save my life or another member of my family in the event of an applicable health emergency.  Perhaps this is an investment you might also want to consider having around for your yourself your loved ones.