ANN ARBOR, Mich. (WXYZ) — Two University of Michigan students are paying it forward one year after a near-death experience that changed both their lives forever.
Ethan King nearly lost his life after suffering a cardiac arrest while on a run on campus in August 2024 when he was a freshman. Now, he and the student who saved him are inspiring others to learn what to do in a similar situation.
Watch Evan Sery's video report below:
"I was with a group of about 30 or so kids when all of a sudden, I stumbled and fell over and collapsed," King said.
Just 18 years old and in his first week at the University of Michigan, King suffered a cardiac arrest that he barely remembers.
"I don't really remember that day or the day before," King said.
Hannah Stovall, though, remembers it all too well.
"Ethan was blue, eyes rolled into the back of his head," Stovall said. "It was not something I thought I'd ever have to see."
Watch our report from last year after the cardiac arrest below:
But it's a good thing she did see it. At the time, Stovall was a senior at Michigan. She was on her way back from Burns Park when she saw King on the ground and immediately began CPR.
"As I was doing compressions, we watched his neck and face go from that pale blue color to splotchy red. I remember hearing someone say 'it's working, it's working,'" Stovall said.
It worked indeed. Just over a year later, King was among six local cardiac arrest survivors being celebrated at a university event Tuesday night, two days before World Restart A Heart Day.
Dr. Robert Neumar is the immediate past chair of emergency medicine at the University of Michigan. He says CPR is the most important therapy in treating cardiac arrest.
"The sooner that CPR is started, the more effective it is," Neumar said. "If they don't get that care in terms of early CPR, early defibrillation, we're limited in what we can do to improve survival once we get to the hospital."
According to the university, more than 350,000 Americans experience sudden cardiac arrest outside the hospital, and nearly 9 in 10 of those people die in part due to not receiving CPR.
"For a lot of people, they feel very disconnected from cardiac arrest, seen as something meant for older people or pre-existing conditions," King said.
It's why King and Stovall started CAP, or Cardiac Arrest Preparation. In the last year, they've trained hundreds of Michigan students in hands-on CPR training.
"I'm kind of paying it forward. Got incredibly lucky that I survived cause the actual survival rate for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest is less than 10%, so I got incredibly lucky that I survived," King said.
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