SCARBOROUGH, Maine (NEWS CENTER) -- His video has been passed around social media; a Scarborough teenager sitting in the hospital, waiting for heart surgery, and thanking everyone who helped save his life when he went into cardiac arrest last week.
"I don't remember anything really before it," says Charlie Piper about Thursday morning's ordeal.
Charlie had gone unresponsive. His 13-year-old sister called 9-1-1 while his father started CPR. Charlie and his father had taken a course on how to administer CPR, but to ensure all went well, a Scarborough dispatcher walked him through it until more help arrived.
"They were able to shock him and get his heart beating again," says Charlie's mother, Nathalie Descheneaux. After 20 hours in a coma, the 15-year-old is slowly starting to become himself again.
"Charlie has a condition called Wolf Parkinson White. It's a heart arrhythmia he was born with but we never knew about until Thursday," says Descheneaux.
"It buys us time; that's the key thing," Scarborough EMS Deputy Chief Tony Attardo says Charlie Piper's story of survival proves just how important general knowledge of CPR is. "It starts that blood flowing to the brain and the heart and the other vital organs, so as long as you can sustain that blood flow, we have a better chance of our medication and defibrillation actually working."
Charlie recorded a video from his hospital room on Friday, to thank everyone who helped him and his family through such a difficult moment. The Scarborough Police Department posted his video on its Facebook page; by Monday it had been shared by more than 200 others.
"I'd like to hit this as more doing this before the emergency," says Attardo, "What can we teach the public ahead of time?"
The American Heart Association offers tips on hands-only CPR and nearby places that offer certification.
Charlie is scheduled for surgery to fix his condition on Thursday. His mother says he should make a full recovery.
