A Life-Changing Decision: A quick stop at a Lifeclinic Health Station helps save a life.
On Friday, February 19, 2008, Mary’s father stopped off at an Albertson’s
supermarket pharmacy in Jupiter, Florida to pick up some over-the-counter medicine
to treat what seemed like routine indigestion. “He said he felt like a bear
was sitting on his chest,” recounts Mary, “and went into the store for
a bottle of Pepto-Bismol.”
Yet in the minutes that followed, Mary’s dad made a decision that ultimately
saved his life.
“After he picked up the Pepto-Bismol, he thought about his ongoing issues
with hypertension, and remembered how his doctor had told him to buy a blood pressure
monitor for his home,” says Mary. However, he never purchased one. “He
didn’t want to spend $100 dollars or more for a machine because he thought
that was too much to pay for it.”
Fortunately, Albertson’s had the foresight to place a Lifeclinic blood pressure monitor in the store’s pharmacy so that customers could
conveniently check their blood pressure at no cost. When Mary’s father saw
the machine, he made the critical decision to check his blood pressure. He took
a seat, slipped his arm into the cuff, and pressed the Start button. Within a minute,
the machine displayed the test results: His heart rate was skyrocketing and his
blood pressure was very high. The systolic blood pressure rate for healthy adults
should be below 120. Mary’s father’s systolic blood pressure reading
was over 200.
Alarmed by the reading, Mary’s father immediately drove himself to the nearby
Jupiter Medical Center. Doctors performed a series of tests and told him that not
only was one of his coronary arteries 98% blocked, but
that he had experienced a myocardial infarction – simply put, a heart attack.
“The doctors decided to transfer and admit him right away to the Gardens Medical
Center. It was an emotional weekend,” says Mary. There, doctors performed
an angioplasty and placed a stent to unblock the severely clogged artery. Today,
Mary’s father is recovering and expects to be back to living an active lifestyle
soon.
“I want to thank someone for having this machine in the store. I can’t
even begin to think of what would have happened if it wasn’t there right at
that moment,” says Mary.
The machine that saved her father’s life was an
LC300 blood pressure monitor made by Lifeclinic, the world’s largest manufacturer of automated commercial blood pressure
monitors and health stations. Each year, Lifeclinic machines enable
millions of Americans to take proactive steps to improve their health. In fact,
with more than 30,000 Lifeclinic machines in use across the country, making a stop
at a Lifeclinic machine has become a routine event for
thousands every week – turning a regular trip to the pharmacy or perhaps the cafeteria at work into a fast, free and convenient way
to proactively check and monitor vital health statistics such as blood pressure
and heart rate. Lifeclinic blood pressure monitors are used over 400 million times
each year.
And in some cases, a quick reading at a Lifeclinic blood pressure
monitor or health station – as illustrated by this dramatic true
story – can provide enough warning to prevent an impending serious medical emergency.
The American Heart Association estimates that 1 in 3 adults have high blood pressure,
and that one in five of these individuals is not aware of their condition. Heart
disease also remains the number-one killer in the U.S. for men and women –
taking more lives than cancer, accidents, diabetes and other causes. For many individuals
affected by high blood pressure, having an easy, fast and no-cost way to quickly
check vital statistics can mean the difference between life and death.
According to Mary, her father’s decision to check his blood pressure at a
Lifeclinic monitor “was a life-changing event.”
