A teenage girl collapsed on stage after performing a cheerleading stunt - before her mother revived her with an electric shock.
Keianna Joe, a 17-year-old cheerleader went into cardiac arrest during a competition in Raleigh, North Carolina, US on March 14.
According to her mother, Andrea Joe, Keianna collapsed during warm-up and required a shock from an Automatic External Defibrillator (AED) to save her life.
Keianna is a student at Western Harnett High School and is part of a competitive cheerleading team that competes in Sanford.
On the day of the competition, she was at Broughton High School in Raleigh when the incident occurred.
Andrea explained that Keianna became unresponsive after a stunt, and at first, they thought she was having a seizure.
"They had just gotten finished with the very first stunt. At that point of the stunt, they come down to where the girls are holding her in a seated position. When she got to that position, she was unresponsive," Andrea said.
However, one of the coaches realised that Keianna didn't have a pulse, and they started performing CPR on her.
Andrea said that she also helped save her daughter's life by administering two sets of compressions and breaths before noticing that the AED machine had arrived.
She quickly attached the paddles to her daughter, and the machine told her that an electric shock was needed.
She gave the shock and continued performing CPR until the medics arrived.
"I had done two sets of compressions and breaths," she said. "I had looked over and toward my left side, and I finally saw that the AED machine had arrived."
Keianna was immediately taken to Wake Med and then transferred to Duke Medical Center for a cardiac MRI, which confirmed that she had suffered a heart attack.
She is currently in the hospital for treatment, and her family has set up a GoFundMe to help cover the costs of testing and hospital expenses.
Andrea expressed her gratitude that an AED was available at the competition and emphasized the importance of having AEDs in facilities where athletes and children are present.
She hopes that by sharing her daughter's story, people will understand how crucial it is to have quick access to lifesaving devices like AEDs.
"If we can save one life with the knowledge of how important it is to get the AED," she said. "Every facility that has any kind of athletes and children at all, they need to have one."
