Church Inn Defibrillator

A regular customer at The Church Inn almost lost his life in September after he suffered from an unexpected cardiac arrest. The pub owners have started an urgent appeal to raise money to have a defibrillator fitted in their pub.

Stephanie Carter, owner of The Church Inn, Swinton, has begun organising a charity fundraiser in hopes of getting a defibrillator fitted.

She explained that after regular customer Craig Warburton, 62, almost lost his life it was time to make a difference within the community.

“Our aim whilst running the pub is obviously community obsessed and (to) champion local causes.

“When this situation happened, we wanted to try and be the hub of the community and we wanted to raise awareness to how important is actually is”

Church Inn
Mike (Left), Craig (Middle), Stephanie (Right)

Stephanie and her partner Mike are hosting a charity day at their pub, the event will run on Saturday 6th November from 2pm onwards. There will be a live DJ, quizzes, and bingo amongst the variety of activities on throughout the day.

“It is going to be a full day; we’ve got our old football team called the Church Inn FC. On the day they’re doing a charity game against another local pubs team and all the money raised for that is going to go towards the defib”

They have also had support from local businesses in and around Swinton, who have donated prizes towards the cause.

“A lot of local businesses have donated gifts for raffles, we’re going to be doing bingo, quizzes and more”

The appeal began after Mr Warburton, suffered a cardiac arrest whilst walking his dog, but was treated by a passing nurse.

“He was just walking his dog as usual on Manchester Road, past McDonald’s and he started to have chest pains and suffered a cardiac arrest and as the ongoing traffic was passing there was a nurse who saw him drop the floor,” said Stephanie.

“She jumped out of her car and performed CPR on Craig and waited with him until the ambulance arrived, who then used a defibrillator on him.

“They stated that without the defibrillator he would have lost his life and he wouldn’t have been able to be revived.”

Church Inn
Photo By: Stephanie Carter

With a lack of available defibrillators in the Salford region, Stephanie explained the importance of having them on hand.

“If you research how many defibrillators are actually in Swinton it’s extremely poor, other than supermarkets around the actual area there’s none to hand and I just think more local businesses and pubs should be championing it.

“You never know when someone might need one. If we can be trained and have access to one it benefits everybody.”

Mr Warburton said: “(They are) very important, it’s a matter between life and death. I never knew how important it was and never knew how much I needed one until I had my cardiac arrest”.

Alongside the event on the 6th November, Stephanie and her partner Mike are also doing a charity plane jump to raise money for the defibrillator. Stephanie explained:

“On the 15th November, myself and Mike my partner, we’re jumping out of a plane in aid of the defibrillator. We’ve set up a GoFundMe page on the Church Inn page”

Their aim is to raise a minimum of 1,500 pounds to cover the cost of having a defibrillator fitted. Any additional monies is being donated to local heart related charities.

The Church Inn have hosted previous charity events, with their most recent event raising over £900 towards Alzheimer’s care. They are continuously looking for ways to help and bring the community together.

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