A Race for Life

Randeep S. Kahlon, M.D.

I celebrated my 55^th birthday in a very different way. That day, I volunteered for the last PICL race of the year at Fair Hill while my son, Rai, a HS Senior at Sanford was racing. During the race, Rai had a mountain bike accident flipping over the handle bars on tough downhill terrain and suffered a concussion. He was evacuated from the woods, evaluated by EMS on site and not cleared to return to riding. 

His bike wheel was destroyed. After taking his bike back to our car in the parking lot, we returned to the team tent to support the other team riders that day. I saw EMS running from their tent with the AED and I immediately ran after them to help. We arrived onsite to find a rider’s dad on the ground having suffered an apparent cardiac event: no pulse and not breathing. The 4 of us (3 EMS techs and myself) then proceeded to perform CPR on the patient to try to resuscitate him. We did get a short response with heart rate after the 2^nd shock but then lost it again and began CPR again. After the 5^th shock, the heart rate returned and stayed. By then, approx. 20 minutes later, EMTs and the ambulance were onsite and quickly evacuated the patient to Christiana Hospital. His son (a rider at the race) and his wife were there during the episode. Per information from Coach Klein the patient had 2 stents and was discharged from Christiana on Mon 10/30 doing well. On my birthday, I was blessed to give the gift of life to someone in need!

A special thanks goes out to everyone involved, especially the two EMTs on site, James Wilner and Daniel Callaway. Thanks to Coach Colbe Klein, Salesianum HS and Ariana Brutico, Events and Logistics Director, Pennsylvania Interscholastic Cycling League for their help and Nick Leh for the photos.