A FIRST responder has started raising money for a defibrillator after realising there currently isn’t one on the main street in Llandrindod Wells.

“If it just saves one person’s life, it will be worth it,” said Wendy Oliver-Lewis.

So far, traders on Middleton Street have chipped in to the fund, donating £100.

Wendy and her husband are both community first responders and carry a defibrillator in their car. When they decided to go around town to see how many there, they noticed there wasn’t one on the main high street in town.

Wendy said that there is a defibrillator at the railway station, but that it would take a while to get there and back, as well as fiddling around getting the code to use it.

“I want to stress the importance of how crucial it is to get a defibrillator to a person,” Wendy said.

Only around eight per cent of people who have out-of-hospital cardiac arrests survive to hospital discharge. Research has shown that bystander assistance through CPR and attaching a defibrillator increases that survival rate to 32 per cent. For patients who have irregular heart rhythms that could lead to a cardiac arrest, the survival rate is 53 per cent. The higher survival rate is thought to be down to the shorter response time.

Wendy says that as Llandrindod Wells is a rural town, it’s even more important defibrillators are around for people to use before the emergency services arrives. “The ambulance crew could be in Brecon, sometimes there isn’t even an ambulance available at all,” she said.

Wendy needs to raise £600 for the defibrillator itself and another £600 for its case and maintenance costs. The defibrillator itself would usually cost twice as much, but the British Heart Foundation is giving a discount. St John Ambulance has also said it will help out; offering to train people to use the defibrillator; first to staff at the Herb Garden, where the defibrillator will be kept before it has a case - with signs in the town centre directing people to it.

Tackling loneliness on Christmas Day - and raising funds for the defibrillator

On Christmas Day the Herb Garden Cafe will open from 11am to 2pm, inviting people in who feel lonely and isolated over the festive period.

They will be able to enjoy some soup and a bread roll, and tea and coffee; and by doing so they’ll be raising money for a defibrillator for the town’s main street.

It’s estimated that 200,000 elderly people will spend the holiday alone this year.

Wendy Oliver-Lewis, the first responder behind the fundraiser, who also works at the cafe, said: “It’s so important that people aren’t alone at Christmas. People think it’s perfect but it’s not for a lot of people.”