By Anthony G. Attrino | NJ.com
nj.com
BERGEN COUNTY, N.J. — An off-duty police officer attending a hockey game Wednesday in Bergen County used his training to save the life of a goalie who collapsed after suffering an apparent heart attack.
Oradell Police Officer Frank Stefano was at the Ice House in Hackensack when he was alerted to a crowd gathering around the goalie for the opposing team.
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“The goalie, who was initially feeling nauseous, collapsed to the ground going into cardiac arrest,” the Oradell PBA said in a Facebook post.
Stefano found the player didn’t have a pulse and immediately began CPR.
The officer asked his wife to call 911 as he grabbed a defibrillator off the wall and “shocked the male party twice, restoring his heartbeat,” the PBA said.
Stefano told ABC -7 he also performed chest compressions and watched as the goalie became conscious.
“He started blinking his eyes and I started asking him, ‘What’s your name, what’s your name?’ He was able to with some trouble, he was able to tell me what his name was,” Stefano told ABC -7.
Paramedics arrived a short time later and took the goalie to a hospital, where he was recovering on Thursday.
One of Stefano’s team members said the officer was in full hockey gear as he performed CPR.
“Proud to call him my teammate,” the player wrote on Facebook.
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