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Partly Cloudy Lawrence-Cedarhurst firefighters revive infant
Cedarhurst 2-year-old wasn’t breathing
A busy afternoon for the Lawrence-Cedarhurst Fire Department became busier as firefighters respondeMay 10 at 4 p.m. to a call for a 2-year-old not breathing.
Department Deputy Chief, Anthony Rivelli Jr., who is also a state certified emergency medical technician, responded within a minute of the call. “When I got to the infant he was lifeless — no respirations and no pulse,” said, Rivelli, who added that this was the third time in three years he was part of a life saving effort with the Woodmere Fire Department.
Immediately he began to clear the boy’s airway of a blockage and performed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. A LCFD engine arrived on the scene and Lt. Moshe Bellehsen and firefighter Justin Caliguri assisted Rivelli.
Caliguri set up an oxygen delivery system and Bellehsen performed a series of “back blows and compressions.” After the blockage was cleared, Rivelli placed the boy into a Woodmere Fire Department ambulance, where a crew of EMTs, including one who is a pediatric emergency nurse, applied additional comprehensive pre-hospital care, according to Rivelli, who helped ventilate the boy as they first took him to St. John’s Episcopal Hospital in Far Rockaway. After his condition was stabilized, he was transferred to LIJ Children’s Hospital.
“It just happened that everybody was in the right place at the right time for the 2-year-old,” said LCFD Chief Joseph Sperber. “Our ambulance had just transported from Lawrence Avenue (an EMS call) and we had personnel from a previous call that provided assistance. Luckily Woodmere was on top of this as well and the child could get prompt, swift, expert care.”
Prior to the infant call, the LCFD had responded to a car accident on Lawrence Avenue, two emergency medical calls and a child locked in a house.
“Rivelli did an outstanding job, it will be a call people don’t forget,” said Woodmere Fire Department Chief Rich Jankosky, who commended everyone on the scene, including his EMT crew of Ross Rieman, nurse Margaret Hempstead, Nicole DeSibio, Benjamin Nelson, Matan Friedman and Adam Slotnik.
