What do you guys recommend?

What is your care plan for afterwards?  Might be the best place to start as those tools will apply to many fields other than one with a tiny untreated survival rate.

I'm not a doctor, but I don't think you just shock someone's heart and they get up and walk it off... are you planning on using it for something other than cardiac arrest?

Some items are best left to those with the necessary skills and education to use them.  Without the proper training and knowledge it sounds like a disaster waiting to happen, IMO.  

If you are connected with a group that has members with the right skills and knowledge then by all means go ahead under their guidance.

Responses are fair...but it is a good idea.  Apocalypse or not.

The main point is to have one and maybe keep the person alive long enough until the ambulance arrives to take them for more extensive medical care.   Not  necessarily for when civilization collapses.

My wife is a nurse and has used them for real and has trained others how to use them.

We have them at work and they have saved several older people.

Even a very basic AED would buy you a shitload of food or a lot of ammo. Do CPR to keep them viable until the guy with a defibrillator shows up if the situation ever arises.

That's what I was trying avoid, waiting for God knows how long.  I want to add one to my medical kit.  I thought this forum was about being prepared...

I will figure out it out, thanks.

Makes more sense.  I don’t think there’s “bad” ones out there, pretty heavy liability I’d image.

To the other poster, I’ve done CPR on two folks.  One made it four days but never regained consciousness, one didn’t make it to the hospital.  Maybe I suck at CPR, maybe it was too long for the call to come and me to get there, who knows.  AEDs have a much better success rate than CPR so how much is a life worth.

IMO one should be in every household.  They cost less than an AR-15 that some have multiples of, and a person is far more likely to need the AED in their lifetimes.

That being said they're not going to do much for you without follow-on care and even then you still have to reign in expectations regarding survival rates after the event, so this is more of a general comment than one regarding some TEOTWAWKI type scenario.

Please do all you can to take care of your health now and encourage your loved ones to do the same, time is the most irreplaceable asset we have.

Being prepared isn't just about being prepared for the apocalypse. Preppers HAVE to break through that mentality because the likelihood of you seeing the apocalypse is almost zero, while the likelihood of you losing someone to a heart attack is much higher. I've personally witnessed someone be saved by an AED, I am not a medical professional so I'm not routinely exposed to that. It was a spectator at a HS sporting event. The purpose of the AED is to keep the person alive until advanced medical care can be rendered.




See above response, but I would like to add to it to address your concern. AEDs are very simple, they have pictures of where to place the pads and many give verbal directions on what to do. 15 minutes of training is all that is needed to be proficient but they're made so they can be used by people with NO training. It's a frontline life-saving apparatus. Would you give the advice to "leave it to the professionals" if someone asked about getting a tourniquet or first aid kit?

Just about every commercial building you walk into today has an AED, my building at work does, my church does, most schools do, many retail stores. It's about time we start keeping them in our homes to be truly prepared. You never know when it's your time. A coworker of mine, 50 y.o., very fit, no health problems just suffered a heart attack. He was very, very remote (hunting) when it happened. Thankfully his wife (a nurse) was with him; she was able to revive him in the truck while driving out of no-man's land. I bet she would have given anything to have an AED at that time even if he didn't actually need it, just because of the power it brings to the situation that DOES need it.

The best thing about the AED is that the first word, automatic, means you just have to hook it up and power it on, it will do the rest. Outside of a machine fault/error it's only going to shock a person if the person actually needs shocked.



IMHO, you don't really know what you're talking about. CPR is not equivalent to a defibrillator. And based upon your response AEDs are much cheaper than you're thinking. This isn't the 90's when we write news articles about the local school dropping $14k on a AED, this is 2021, when a AED can be had for the cost of middle tier AR15.

Plus, some people don't live 5 minutes from the hospital. My wife isn't going to be able to do effective CPR on me for 30 minutes waiting for the EMS. If only there was something that could help get the heart back into an effective rhythm...somebody should invent something and we should make it cheap enough we could have one in every house!

Early electrical intervention is the key to surviving a cardiac event.  CPR will circulate blood but you need to get the heart back into a perfusing rhythm.  I've used them a couple of times or arrived on scene as they were being used (the pads from some of them will interface with more advanced monitors, some won't).  They're stupid simple to use by design and work extremely well within the scope of their design.  You do need a minimal amount of training and you need to understand when to use one and what to do immediately afterwards while waiting for ALS (Advanced Life Support) to arrive.  I can't say as I'm really partial to any one model other than to say get one that has pictograms and talks you through the steps; they all work about the same and I've taught the classes on using them to plenty of people over the years.  Zoll, Phillips and Physio-control are well known names and are probably the most commonly encountered.  

Pick whichever model you like, get the case, extra pads (check the dates), add a shaving razor, some sort of wipes and a CPR mask.  Take a class on CPR and AED use and place it somewhere readily accessible.

Here’s a recent thread in another sub forum.
https://www.ar15.com/forums/outdoors/My-Philips-AED-finally-arrived-today-/17-701767/

If you’ve got the cash I guess there isn’t much downside that I can think of. They do the thinking so if it’s a shockable rhythm you just have to push the button. You probably won’t find a lot of people that own them because they’re expensive.

I’d just do some basic searching and stick to a name brand like the Phillips in the linked thread and you’ll probably be fine.

Fair points on both posts, as someone else has said I believe any AED from any reputable medical company will suit your needs, they've gotten pretty dummy proof. The ones I've been trained on will tell you if you have incorrect pad placement and will not function until you place it correctly and then the machine will diagnose and decide if it needs to do anything, they usually have big easy to see pictures showing the correct placement as well.

I was going to post this as well.  Early defibrillation is linked to higher survivability rates.  Also look at how long a response time would be.  You really up for doing cpr for that long?  The longer you are doing cpr the worse the cpr becomes you slow down become more shallow.  Thats why pit crew style cpr is a thing with compressors changing out every 2 minutes at a pulse check is a thing.

Doesn't really matter which one you get, all are FDA approved.

As I get older, thinking about getting one.

Even good CPR after a witnessed event in the field has a dismal success rate if you define success as leaving the hospital more or less as good as you went in (8-9%).  AEDs seem to dramatically improve that.  And since most cardiac arrests happen at home, it makes sense to have one.




Article in Circulation a few years ago found the following with public use of AEDs:

Cardiac arrest victims who received a shock from a publicly-available AED that was administered by a bystander had 2.62 times higher odds of survival to hospital discharge and 2.73 times more favorable outcomes for functioning compared to victims who first received an AED shock after emergency responders arrived.

Victims who received an AED shock from a bystander (57.1 percent) using a publicly-available device instead of having to wait for emergency responders (32.7 percent) had near normal function and better outcomes.


Without a bystander using AED shock therapy, 70 percent of cardiac arrest patients either died or survived with impaired brain function.

AED use is covered in BLS (basic CPR class)

It is easy to be trained on how to use them.

My guess is having whoever connected the pads to call 911.

CPR has a less than 10% of 'keeping them viable'.

More people die in the US every year of cardiac events than starvation or ongoing gun battles.

Thanks for the  info guys.  I will probably go with a Phillips Recertified AED.

https://acmerevival.com/product/phillips-heartstart-frx-defibrillator-for-sale/?gclid=Cj0KCQiAq7COBhC2ARIsANsPATG-4ayYI-KmSgAnNaMhfxfAF9vlJhWZHkT59oB2Bsud8NRWOc4OSK0aAsGDEALw_wcB

You can use HSA/FSA money for them.

I would go with a used refurbished model.

The pads will dry out after a while (year or two)
Also add a razor and a small towel in the box.
Razor for shaving gorillas
Towel for drying off swimmers.
Toss in a cpr mask or a BVM.

I was buying an AED for my office.  It occurred to me that providing more protection for strangers at my office than my own family…….myself included.

I coughed up the cash and bought 2…….one for the house and one for the office.

Honestly…if you’re worried about the end of the world…take note of where you see them in public. They are not practical to maintain as an individual. Batteries need regular replacement. Just know where you could acquire one if you needed to.

The pads will have an expiration date on them; as long as the package isn't damaged they're probably still good but should be relegated to training use.  Depending on the machine it should have some sort of indicator of battery status- a light, an audible beeper, a bar indicator, etc.  It's simple enough to put them on whatever checklist you have for routine inspections and maintenance such as when you check/replace your smoke/CO detector batteries, etc.  You can pick up a spare battery or have yours serviced at the manufacturer's recommended intervals (the Zoll Plus for example has a five year shelf life on its battery and pads).  Depending on the model you can run self tests on it or it will periodically do it itself.

If you or someone in your house is at risk of a cardiac event I'd say it's a good investment, at least as long as emergency services are available since you're going to need follow up care.

I think Sandbox Medic covered it pretty well.

In ACLS, we were taught that (on average, and barring any extenuating circumstances like hypothermia, etc.) for every minute’s delay in defibrillation, the odds of return of spontaneous circulation decreased by 10%.

We live in a rural area, where the speediest of our volunteer First Responders would have difficulty getting to our place in less than 10 minutes.

Certainly, you can’t reasonably expect a person to be right as rain after successful defibrillation. There’s a reason the heart went into fibrillation, and it’s going to take some talented, highly paid folks with expensive equipment to fix the reason, unless it’s maybe something like electrocution or R on T Phenomenon. But spontaneous circulation by a beating heart is way better at perfusing the brain than the best CPR.

Our AED at home is to hopefully buy time until ALS can arrive and transport. Grid down/no definitive care, an AED is probably of limited use.

I know this is an old thread by I thought it would be worth adding.

We had our AED training at work last week.  The trainer mentioned that some insurance companies will cover one for in the home.  Find the exact model you want and have your Dr write a prescription for it.  I think she said she got one for her house and she only paid $80 on a machine that was over 1k.

She said she got hers through AEDsuperstore.com. You might email them about if they take insurance and how to go about doing so.

Hope this helps you guys.

We talk about ounces equaling pounds, and choosing gear carefully. Imho, as someone who has used an Aed about 100 times, I must tell you that I wouldn't waste the weight or space. What scenarios do you envision it would be needed? A traumatic arrest, which will be common in shtf, has an issue that the defibrillator won't fix. Theyll need blood, or an intact brain. Everything else, you'll need further care as well. Heart attack? They'll need either a stent in a Cath lab or open heart surgery. Sepsis/infection? They'll need iv antibiotics and around the clock ICU care. Diabetic? If they have reached cardiac arrest, you are too late to the game to start giving them sugar.

You could make an argument for some airway stuff. But again, most of that is situationally dependent.