BELOIT, Wis. — After a Rock County toddler nearly drowned, one Wisconsin mother made an urgent call-to-action to keep children safe.
At a fun-filled June family gathering, Morgan Copeland-Jensen said it happened so fast.
“In a split second,” she said.
Her now 4-year-old, Gatlin, somehow found his way into the pool.
“You know, none of us knew. I’d like to think that I’m always very cautious and diligent about it. And it still happened,” she said about the near-drowning experience.
Gatlin spent two long and scary weeks in UW Health Kids Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. The Beloit boy was intubated for ten of those days.
Copeland-Jensen recently showed Gatlin his grim hospital picture.
“So, do you remember that?” she asked. Gatlin shook his head no.
“You don’t remember that [because] we had you pretty sedated so that you wouldn’t remember anything,” she said.
As a Mercyhealth Emergency Room nurse, Copeland-Jensen said she remembered to do something very important in those first few precious moments after the incident.
“Knowing CPR skills and rescue breathing and just how critical those first few minutes are helped tremendously in order to get the ball rolling and saving Gatlin’s life,” she said.
In the Mercyhealth training center, CPR instructor Mike Vorpahl sang his best rendition of “Baby Shark” while pressing down with two fingers on an infant model’s chest. He said it can make a huge difference because the song uses the necessary 100-120 beats per minute.
“When I teach child CPR, I always sing ‘Baby Shark,’ which is kind of the new one that’s out there, and I think anyone that has an infant or a child right now knows ‘Baby Shark,’” he said.
Mercyhealth Director Christopher Wistrom agreed and said his ER needed more CPR-trained heroes to help his medical rescue team.
“We’ve had three that I know of this summer, drownings that were saved by bystander CPR. And it’s the bystander that makes a difference,” he said. “Calling 911 is important, but getting your hands on that chest, circulating that blood oxygenating that brain. It’s the difference between life and death.”
Copeland-Jensen said they were very lucky to have the outcome they did with her son. She said the complications of near-drownings in the ER are few and far between.
“We were super blessed from start to finish and this can happen to anybody,” she said about why she wanted to share Gatlin’s story.
Wistrom echoed the reminder about the importance of taking a CPR class.
“It doesn’t take a lot of water to drown you, but it takes a lot of nerve to know what to do and to take that step and save that person,” he said.
Mercyhealth is offering special CPR classes for businesses, families or anyone hoping to learn the skill. You can learn more, here.