CPR from quick-acting doctor saves man suffering cardiac arrest

It's a connection two people will have for a lifetime.

Lawrence Cohen suffered a cardiac arrest in an ice cream parlour in Montreal's NDG neighbourhood and was saved by Dr. Ilana Bank, who gave him CPR.

"She's just like a guardian angel," said Cohen. "I mean, if not for her, I wouldn't be here now. I'm just lucky to be alive."

Cohen and Bank are sharing their story in the hopes that more people will learn CPR.

Bank is an emergency physician at the Montreal Children's Hospital and made a last-minute decision that day to grab a cone at the Diperie ice cream shop on Monkland Avenue.

During that brief time, one of the owners ran outside in a panic.

"She opened the door and she's like, 'Oh my God, you're medical! Somebody just collapsed!'" said Bank.

Cohen was on the ground.

"[I] looked at him and I said, 'Lawrence, what's the matter?'" said Diperie owner Doug Ayoub.

Cohen, an audio-video technician, was there on a job when he went into cardiac arrest.

That's when Bank sprang into action and performed CPR for seven minutes until paramedics arrived.

"It's really just: push hard, push fast, and that's what I did," she said. "I pushed hard, I pushed fast."

Cohen was clinically dead for 12 minutes and intubated for eight days.

For people who suffer cardiac arrest outside a hospital, the chance of surviving is slim.

It wasn't the ending Bank was expecting when she called the Diperie for an update.

"I think I jumped out of my seat. I said, 'What?' and they're like, 'Yeah, he's alive!'" she said.

Even Cohen's neurologist was surprised.

"He said you're one per cent of people who survive," said Cohen. "You shouldn't be alive. You should be dead. So that's a wake-up call."

It was a wake up call for the Diperie's owners as well.

"I felt quite helpless because I didn't know any lifesaving measures," said Ayoub.

Cohen and Bank hope people will take away the lesson that you don't have to be a doctor to learn CPR.

"It's about having the frame of mind if something like this is to happen, I'm going to be open to doing the best I can, and that's all we can do," said Bank. "And that's really just push hard, push fast."

Years before Cohen had a heart attack, he underwent a quintuple bypass.

"I've basically died three times, so I've got six lives left," said Cohen.

With his sense of humour intact, Cohen tries not to sweat the small stuff these days.