Two members of the National Police saved the life of a 72-year-old British woman on Sunday afternoon. The alarm was raised at 14.30 following an emergency call from her son-in-law.
"We had arranged to meet on the Sunday but she was not picking up her phone, so we decided to head down to where she was staying to make sure everything was all right," the son-in-law told the Bulletin yesterday.
"When we got there, my wife, who is expecting our first child and the grandson her mother had come over to see born, could raise no reply but we could hear the mobile phone ringing unanswered inside.
"I immediately called the police, they told me to call the emergency services and then the police again. I did all that and told my wife to go out into the street and flag down the first police car she could see. Within minutes she spotted one and it was one which had been dispatched to the scene.
"At first we couldn’t get through the front door, but the officers discussed the situation with my wife and we decided to proceed. They used a thin sheet of plastic to slip open the lock and then pushed the door in." They found the mother-in-law in bed suffering from severe breathing problems and violent coughing and the officers did everything they could to stop her from drowning in her own vomit.
According to the police report, an ambulance and paramedics were called while the police put the victim in a safe position and stabilised her until the ambulance arrived.
"The police were very good, they put her in all the right positions in order to prevent any more complications and then she was rushed to Son Llatzer and then Son Espases, where she was admitted to intensive care. That it where she will stay for a few days."
Family sources and the emergency services say the victim suffered a stroke and then began vomiting. Liquid had passed into the lungs so she is also suffering from a slight bout of pneumonia.
"We have no idea when she had the stroke. She’s extremely fit and healthy for her age. She goes out swimming every morning and we know that a friend spoke to her at 11pm on the Saturday, so we really don’t know how long she had been in that condition. There was some bleeding on the brain detected, but that has since stopped. She’s still critical, but in the right place.
"We’ll just have to wait now, we’re in limbo I guess," the son-in-law told the Bulletin. "But the two police officers did a great job and we’re extremely grateful."