GOTHENBURG, Sweden, - Everdrone has announced it is now deploying a drone system that delivers Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs) to the scene of cardiac arrests. In doing so, bystanders will now have the ability to initiate life-saving measures while awaiting professional medical care.
Out-of-hospital cardiac arrests affect some 275,000 individuals in Europe each year and carry a low survival rate of about 10%. Research suggests when CPR and early defibrillation is initiated within the first few minutes the survival rate could potentially increase to as much as 70%.
Now available to more than 80,000 residents in the Gothenburg area of Sweden, the service is part of a clinical study in collaboration with Sweden’s national emergency call center, SOS Alarm, and the Center for Resuscitation Science at Karolinska Institutet (KI).
“By combining our state-of-the-art drone platform and know-how in the regulatory space, we are finally able to launch this life-saving application,” says Mats Sällström, CEO of Everdrone. “The collaboration with SOS Alarm and KI has been absolutely crucial for the realization of the concept in terms of being able to perform a swift alarm response, and to manage the medical and ethical issues involved.”
The outcome of the emergency operations will continuously be evaluated within a research study conducted by KI.
“We see enormous potential for this type of fully-integrated drone system. This study is unique, the first of its kind in the world, and we look forward to objectively evaluating the project together with Everdrone and SOS Alarm,” says Andreas Claesson, Associate Professor at KI.
The results of the study will be presented by KI later this year, with the hope of expanding operations to other parts of Sweden and Europe by 2021.
