Dead For 40 Minutes: How Was Colin Fiedler Brought Back To Life?

After being clinically dead for about 40 minutes, Colin Fiedler, a 39-year-old Australian man, was one of three cardiac arrest patients brought back to life last June at The Alfred hospital in Melbourne. The other two patients had been dead for as long as an hour before being brought back to life using two new trial procedures pioneered in Australia and as yet available only at The Alfred. Fiedler and the other two patients have since returned home without disability.

In the ambulance, Australia's Herald Sun reported, emergency responders had given Fiedler a choice of hospitals.

"For some reason, I said The Alfred, which is pretty lucky because they are the only one that has it," he told the newspaper.

The technique utilizes Autopulse -- an automated CPR machine -- and extracorporeal membrane oxygenation - itself a technique which comes in a variety of forms but involves providing respiratory support to patients whose heart and lungs can no longer perform properly. Seven cardiac arrest patients have so far been treated at The Alfred using a combination of these two recourses, which allows doctors to keep blood and oxygen circulating to vital organs and the brain -- reducing the risk of permanent disability -- while simultaneously diagnosing the cause of the cardiac arrest and treating it.

Fiedler, who is from the southeastern state of Victoria, said that since recovering, he has pledged to start a new tack when it comes to his health by quitting smoking and not sweating the small things in life.

Senior intensive care physician Professor Stephen Bernard told the Herald Sun that the results from the first two years of the trial were exciting and that he hoped the system could eventually be incorporated into use in hospitals across Melbourne. Bernard added that it required three trained intensive-care physicians and all of the necessary machinery ready for use, something which no other hospital in the state of Victoria currently has. Autopulse is available in three of The Alfred's ambulances, but the company which provided the machine has offered to supply more.

The CPR machine was also used last year in the case of former junior world champion swimmer Clare Carney after she went into cardiac arrest.