Shmulik Markowitz, paramedic

To whom it may concern,
Dear colleagues,
We flew from TLV to BRU with ELAL and as you probably are aware, there was a passenger on board that lost consciousness and went into arrest.
I was called by the family to quickly come check on her, as you may know, I am part of Hatzalah for about 20 years and coordinator of Hatzalah in Antwerp as well.
Right away the situation was properly identified and I requested the crew member to bring me their medical equipment on board.
Along with 2 more passengers trained in First aid we administered the correct procedural CPR guidelines.
The reason for my email is actually for 3 reasons.
First reason, the crew, they were calm cool, collective and very on top of their game. The team leader(and the rest) was not only helpful but truly professional and in my years of experience, rare to find someone with such common sense during a chaotic moment.
Second reason: The medical equipment on board. Well put together, adequate equipment, thought out and complete. I was especially impressed with the up to date latest innovative design of BVM (the Pocket bag-valve-mask by MicroBVM) that was in the kit. This new innovation created by Israeli Paramedics is not only compact but easy to use and rugged. The only thing I would recommend is an extra set of AED (defibrillator ) pads and a longer lasting O2 (oxygen) tank that can deliver more than 4 liters/min.
Third reason: the pilot. His record timing to bring us back to TLV was commendable and incredible. This surely improved our chain of survival and the ability to keep up the CPR during right until the ground medical team took over.
The patient arrived against all odds to the hospital with a pulse. This shows the effectiveness of our collective and effective CPR.
Unfortunately the patient did not survive and passed away later at the hospital, but the family can definitely make peace with the fact that even at 7000ft, their mother received the best possible care and hand in hand, pilot, crew and us acted professionally and diligently.
Thank you ELAL for proving once again that you care, but you literally travel that extra mile!
Shmulik Markowitz
Article on Ynet (Israeli online newspaper that covered the story https://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-5028862,00.html)