This Toddler's Heart Stopped For 3 Hours, Team Effort Of Medics Saved Him

A 20-month-old boy named Waylon Saunders who fell into an outdoor pool at a home daycare in Petrolia, in southwestern Ontario, Canada, on January 24 and had been there for at least five minutes was cold and lifeless when firefighters brought him to Charlotte Eleanor Englehart Hospital. The medical personnel at the hospital, however, made an amazing and persistent effort to save the adorable child.

According to CBC News, Petrolia is 100 kilometres from London, and the hospital lacks the resources and personnel of a significant children's hospital. Everyone that day, including lab workers and nurses, stopped what they were doing and started assisting with the task of resuscitating Waylon.

They alternated giving the child CPR for three hours.

According to a release by the London Health Sciences Centre Once the medical staff heard that Waylon was coming, everyone who could came to help.

"It was truly a team effort: lab techs were holding portable heaters in the room at one point; EMS personnel also helped out by rotating through as compressors and helping with managing his airway, and nurses were even running to microwave water to help with warming," Dr. Taylor explains. "And the whole time we had support on the line from the team in London."

Waylon was released from the hospital on February 6 and is now recuperating at home, almost two weeks to the day. His family is confident that staying at home will help with his care journey moving forward, despite the fact that there is undoubtedly a long road ahead.

Drs. Taylor and Tijssen agree that it was a combination of skill, determination, and teamwork that kept Waylon alive that day.

"He beat the odds. Everyone worked so well together, and the transition was seamless between different stages of his care journey," Dr. Tijssen says. "Everyone used their skills, and we truly worked as a team. We couldn't have hoped for a better outcome."