Best friends step up to save woman with CPR 

Shortly after midnight, best friends Tyler, 17, and Levi, 18, were driving home when they saw a vehicle off the road in Sudbury, Ont. The vehicle had hit a fence.     

Immediately going back to check on the driver, they found a woman unresponsive and not breathing.      

Tyler, a Grade 12 student at Lasalle Secondary School, and Levi, a graduate of Collège Notre-Dame, were trained in the ACT High School CPR and AED Program and knew what to do.      

While a bystander called 911, Tyler and Levi placed the woman on the ground and quickly started CPR. Tyler alternated compressions with Levi until firefighters arrived and took over, with EMS then transporting the woman to hospital.     

Claudette, 63, had been driving home from her shift at a local hospice, where she had celebrated her birthday with colleagues before leaving. With no memory of what happened, Claudette woke up in the hospital to learn she had suffered a cardiac arrest.     

“I never thought that would happen to me, ever,” says Claudette, who is so grateful for Tyler and Levi’s quick response. “They gave me my life,” says the grandmother of nine, as she recovers at home with the help of her daughter and sons.     

“The training definitely helped me with my confidence and in actually knowing what to do,” says Tyler.      

Matt, Coordinator of Physical Education and Physical Literacy at Rainbow District School Board, is proud of the boys and says the program is essential.      

“This is how they [students] develop empathy, care, and compassion for people in their community, and learn to step up. Putting somebody before themselves, in terms of having a CPR program, brings those soft skills to life,” says Matt.      

“It says a lot about the training they’ve had,” says Jody, Tyler’s mother, “and what this program really does to create strong, courageous kids.”  

The ACT Foundation set up the High School CPR and AED Program at Lasalle Secondary School in 2011. Collège Notre-Dame was set up with the ACT High School CPR Program in 2006, followed with the AED enhancement in 2011.  

ACT’s Ontario provincial partner is Hydro One and ACT’s national health partners are AstraZeneca Canada and Amgen Canada. 

The Advanced Coronary Treatment (ACT) Foundation is the award-winning, national, charitable organization establishing free CPR and AED training programs in high schools across Canada. ACT raises funds to donate mannequins and teacher training to schools, and guides schools in program set up and long-term sustainability. More than 4.8 million youth have been trained in CPR by their teachers through this lifesaving program to date.