Body cam footage shows Utah nurse save man’s life during heart attack

Body cam footage shows Utah nurse save man’s life during heart attack
In a matter of seconds after officials said Darren Ewell collapsed, Danya Topham was running onto the baseball field.

Not finding a pulse, Topham, an off-duty registered nurse at Intermountain Healthcare begin administering CPR. When first responders from the Murray Police Department and Fire Department took over, Topham said she told her son she didn’t think Ewell was going to make it.

But right before the ambulance doors closed, Topham heard someone speak to Ewell.

“I thought, ‘Holy crap. He woke up!’ I was just in shock,” said Topham. “I was so excited.”

Ewell said he doesn’t remember much about that night other than waking up in the hospital with broken ribs, but he desperately wanted to meet the woman who saved his life.

“If she didn’t immediately take aggressive action and do CPR and, you know, break my ribs, as my doctor said, ‘There’s no way you would have had the mental faculty to even survive a heart attack because the oxygen would not have gotten to your brain'” said Ewell.

On Tuesday, Murray city leaders presented Topham, as well as several first responders, received life-saving awards for their actions.

Topham said she hopes this story encourages more people to learn how to do CPR, something the city of Murray offers for free on the second Tuesday of every month.