National Collegiate Athletic Association

NCAA News Archive - 2010

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Jan 26, 2010 9:13:13 AM

Athletic trainers from rival Peach Belt Conference schools worked together to save a life before their schools' January 20 basketball game.

Daniel Hinely, Armstrong Atlantic State's head athletic trainer, and Daniel Hannah, director of Lander's athletic training curriculum, administered cardiopulmonary resuscitation to a Lander faculty member who had become unconscious on the sidewalk outside of Lander's John Drummond Complex.

The situation developed when the Armstrong Atlantic State team bus driver noticed Lander assistant professor Charles Sacoco fall to the ground on a nearby sidewalk. Hinely quickly left the bus, assessed Sacoco's status, called emergency medical services on his cell phone and began CPR.

Sacoco was not breathing and had suffered a heart attack. The bus driver went inside the Drummond Complex to find additional help and to locate an automated external defibrillator. There he found Hannah, who secured the AED and helped Hinely with CPR until an ambulance arrived. Sacoco was taken to a hospital and is reported to be doing well.

 "You go through so much training for situations like these but never expect to put them in action," Hinely said. "I'm just happy to have been able to provide the necessary treatment at the right time."

Hannah directs the undergraduate athletic training curriculum in the department of physical education and exercise science at Lander. Hinely is the treasurer of the Georgia Athletic Trainers' Association.