Treat Heart Attacks With iPhone App

Daniel Low, consultant anaesthetist at the Royal United Hospital in Bath, designed the iResus application for iPhones, which aims to reduce the risk of human error while digonising patients suffering from cardiac arrest.

The phone is featured to promt the doctors throughout the treatment. The prompts depend on the age and condition of the patients.

Almost 2,500 doctors, mainly from England have downloaded the application so far.

Daniel Low was inspired to create the application after working alongside air ambulance helicopter pilots who previously worked for the military. He saw that during in-flight emergencies, airmen would refer to instruction cards known as flight reference charts, which guided them through the crisis and helped to reduce the margin for human error.

"Even though doctors and nurses are trained to deal with someone having a cardiac arrest, it's not a situation they will face every day and I thought both medicine and patients would benefit from an application such as this," said Low.