Two people in the town of North Greenbush are fortunate to be alive, thanks to the work of first-responders.

The town held a ceremony on Thursday honoring firefighters, police and EMS for saving two people from cardiac arrest this past spring.

People filled the room at North Greenbush Town Hall for the event.

Town Board member Kelly Hoffman said the town has the best emergency services.

“Thank you all so much for everything that you did to save their lives. That’s all I can say,” she said.

Families also expressed gratitude. Brittany Gould, the daughter of one of the survivors, said everyone came within three minutes.  

One doctor who was at the scene told NewsChannel 13 how rare these life-saving events are.

“In medicine, we consider these patients dead, and we were able to turn that around and obviously they’re walking and talking,” said Dr. Warren Hayashi. “And for the survivors and the families, this is everything.”

Hayashi said it is important in these cases to start CPR as soon as possible.

“It buys time for people to have blood flow to the brain and their heart, so when the first-responders get there, they can hopefully get it restarted,” he said.

Town Supervisor Joseph Bott said only 5 to 10% of patients survive when CPR is performed outside of a hospital, so this is rare.