Upgrade ensures defibrillator available at all times

The need to buy a new defibrillator for the Drouin Anglican Church Hall has been avoided after maintenance work by Drouin Rotary Club.
The Drouin Hills Probus Club that regularly uses the hall raised an alert after noticing the machine regularly beeped.
An inspection by Rotary's Leigh Bates found that rather than installing a new machine, the existing one could be back in full working order with a new battery and adult pads that his club funded.
Probus secretary Shirley Haynes said members of the club were "very grateful for the generosity of Rotary" that had overcome concerns that a faulty machine would not protect members when needed.
The appreciation was endorsed by the church's administration officer Wendy Shiels.
She said they were planning to buy a new machine but the contribution by Rotary meant all users of the hall were immediately protected.
Rotarians have been involved with installing defibrillators in a number of locations in Drouin and Mr Bates stressed the importance that all were registered at registermyaed.ambulance.vic.gov.au/
Registration enables calls to triple zero (000) about heart attacks to guide callers to the nearest AED (automatic external defibrillator) while waiting for an ambulance, he said.