Northamptonshire mum thanks 'amazing' East Midlands Ambulance paramedics who saved her life
CPR by Ashleigh Loach's husband Dave was crucial in saving her life, as ITV News Anglia's Stuart Leithes reports
A woman who suffered a life-threatening cardiac arrest has thanked the "absolutely amazing" paramedics who saved her life.
Ashleigh Loach was only 29 years old when she collapsed at her home in Dallington near Northampton on 30 October 2018.
Her husband Dave Loach provided crucial CPR, with East Midlands Ambulance Service paramedics arriving just six minutes after he called 999.
Now the couple have been reunited with the ambulance crew and Mrs Loach said: "They're incredible. They're absolutely amazing. I could not do their job.
"I wouldn't want to do that job. But I'm so grateful that they do their job and they genuinely care as well.
"I'm here. I'm a mum, I'm a wife. I'm incredibly, incredibly lucky to be here because my husband was told that I was going to die and I've got 24 hours. So I'm incredibly grateful to be here."
The couple had arrived home from a night out and Mrs Loach was feeling unwell, not long after the birth of her youngest child Paisley.
She put it down to her symptoms of Crohn's Disease, but then collapsed and stopped breathing, with Mr Loach jumping into action.
"I called 999 and then I was speaking with them," he said.
“I knew something was wrong with Ashleigh, she looked grey and gaunt and my survival mode kicked in.
"I then got Ashleigh off the bed and I did CPR on her for what probably felt like to me 15, 20 minutes, but it was only six minutes. It was a difficult night."
Paramedic Gary Taylor and technician Scott Lovett made their way to the scene, followed by Matt Stringfellow, Matthew Flounders and paramedics Ian French, Wendy Hamilton and Rebecca Illingworth.
Mrs Loach stabilised and was treated at Kettering General Hospital for two weeks, but was then able to return home to her family.
Six years later and the medics met Mr and Mrs Loach again at the couple's garden centre near Daventry.
Matt Stringfellow, part of the ambulance crew who helped save her, reiterated the importance of members of the public knowing how to carry out CPR.
"People learning how to do bystander CPR and having access to public access defibrillators is so vital", he said.
"Ashleigh's outcome is hugely down to her husband Dave's actions that night by doing really effective CPR."
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