West Midlands Ambulance Service has launched the ‘Let Us See Your AED’ campaign to encourage the registration of Defibrillators on the British Heart Foundation’s ‘The Circuit’ website.

There are over 30,000 out of hospital cardiac arrests in the UK per year with less than 8% of people surviving to the point of hospital discharge. This is because for every minute CPR and the use of an AED is not administered, the chances of survival decrease by 10%.

Ambulance Service call assessors use 'The Circuit' to help direct callers to the nearest AED within 500m of where the cardiac arrest is occurring.

If an AED isn't registered on The Circuit, WMAS does not have access to information such as location and access codes needed to instruct a bystander in its use. Currently there are at least 2778 AEDs that are unregistered and not accessible by WMAS. Paramedic Practice and Patient Safety Director, Nick Henry said:

“It is vital that we get as many people as possible to register AEDs on The Circuit. Having AEDs available to bystanders in a cardiac arrest situation, saves lives.

"However, for us to be able to instruct the caller on how to gain access to these AEDs they must be registered. It only takes a few minutes to register and could make all the difference in a life-or-death situation”.

To find out more about the ‘Let Us See Your AED’ campaign, you can visit 'OfficialWMAS' on social media and follow the hashtag #LetUsSeeYourAED.