Founder's Story

It all started in Seattle in 1995. Dale was a victim of his heredity and suffered a heart attack when he was 36 years old. Technically known as MI (Myocardial Infarction), it was caused by a blockage in his LAD (left anterior descending artery).

He was a very active, non-drinker, non-smoker who played college baseball. The blockage wasn't severe enough to warrant a stent or bypass surgery, so diet and exercise were prescribed. Dale moved to Minnesota for his job and regularly visited his cardiologist, undergoing annual stress tests, which he passed without issues.

In 1998, Dale Wakasugi began refereeing high school basketball, but on December 13, 2007, with five minutes left in a game at Fridley High School, the 49-year-old suffered a cardiac arrest. As people gathered to help, someone grabbed an AED from the wall of the gymnasium. One of the heroes was 11th-grader Lindsey Paradise, now a good friend of Dale's. She had learned how to perform CPR and use an AED just three weeks earlier in health class.

That trip to the emergency ward resulted in Dale having three stents inserted in his LAD, the very thing his cardiologist had predicted might occur if the plaque broke off. Three days later, he was home recuperating when he started feeling sick. Dale's stents clotted, and he suffered a heart attack, this time from clots forming around the stents. He took another trip to the catheterization laboratory that day and received two additional stents to seal the edges of the previous one.

AEDs & Accessories