Portage County is participating in a new app to speed up assistance for people having a heart emergency. The app, called PulsePoint, is designed to alert app users and first responders to people nearby who are experiencing cardiac arrest. It also helps you find the nearest automated external defibrillators (AED).
The app gives anybody in the nearby area with CPR knowledge a chance to help save a life while first responders are on their way to the scene.
"In Portage County, we have the city of Stevens Point and we have ambulances in Plover and Amherst as well. But we have a lot of rural communities too," explained Amber Osowski, EMS coordinator for Portage County. "But we have a lot of awesome first responders who live out in those rural communities, and if they know that somebody needs help and they can be there within minutes to start compressions and get an AED on somebody that can increase somebody's survival by 90 percent at least."