Life-saving awards were presented Monday in Pleasant Prairie to a nursing student and a Costco employee who also serves as a volunteer firefighter.
Last month Gwen Gernenz, who's a nursing student at Herzing University in Kenosha, witnessed a 60 year-old shopper pass out and fall in the store's parking lot. Gernenz immediately started performing CPR chest compressions.
She was soon joined by Cory Baker, a tire center manager who is employed part-time by fire departments in Twin Lakes and Lake Geneva.
Baker brought with him a defibrillator that was used to administer an electric shock that got the patient breathing and talking again.
"The interventions and decision to become involved by both individuals is without a doubt the only reason this patient survived," said Pleasant Prairie Fire Chief Craig Roepke in a news release. "It is a textbook example that demonstrates when efforts are taken to train and equip civilian bystanders and they engage in a crisis, that spectacular outcomes can occur. This is what we strive for," he said.
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