The colleagues of a loved Coles employee who died following a cardiac arrest are advocating for more public CPR training, which they believe may have saved their valued team member’s life.
Vaibhav Kaushik, 39, arrived home from a night out about midnight on Wednesday, November 15 when he suddenly felt nauseous and began vomiting.
Kaushik’s Uber driver rushed to his aid and called triple-0 when he collapsed on the front steps of his house, his colleague, Mona Patel, was told.
Watch the latest news and stream for free on 7plus >>
“His heart stopped for more than half an hour … paramedics tried to resuscitate him for 20 minutes before his heart rate came back up,” Patel told 7NEWS.com.au.
Kaushik was taken to Royal Melbourne Hospital, where he placed in a medically induced coma.
Workmates were alerted to the emergency by one of Kaushik’s relatives.
Patel said a number of follow-up scans revealed Kaushik was brain-dead as a result of delayed CPR.
“It took them 20 minutes before he was resuscitated, which led to severe brain injury due to no oxygen to his brain for that long period of time,” she said.
Kaushik’s family in India made the difficult decision to turn off his life support on Tuesday, November 21.
Kaushik hadn’t seen his family for more than a decade, and the family were not able to see his body before it was cremated, Patel said.
She said Kaushik worked hard to financially support his family and hoped he could one day bring his parents to Australia.
“It came in as a big blow. How could he, even at that young age, have a cardiac arrest?” Patel said.
Kaushik, nicknamed VB, had been working at Coles Port Melbourne for about a year, including as a night-fill manager, before he died.
Patel had worked with him for four months but in that short time, she said, she quickly realised why everyone at the store loved him dearly.
“I felt like I had known him a lifetime. He loved life. He looked out for everyone, always had a smile on his face,” she said.
“He did things at his own expense, that’s how much he looked out for people.
“He always said, ‘I’m here. Don’t worry about it. I’ll take care of it’.”
Patel described him as a “father figure” to some of the young employees.
She said he died about a month before his 40th birthday.
“He had the biggest heart, kindest soul. Always motivated others to do the best. Always looked after everyone and that big heart was the first thing that failed,” Patel said.
Kaushik’s team have created an online fundraiser for his family in India, and to pay off any remaining debts he had.
They also hope to organise CPR training and buy defibrillators for their local community, to potentially prevent further deaths as a result of cardiac arrests.
“The biggest thing in VB’s case, why he couldn’t survive, was because he wasn’t given CPR in time,” Patel said.
The online fundraiser as so far raised more than $15,000.