Our Emergency Medicine consultant, Andy Lockey, has been shortlisted for a BAFTA!
Andy is one of the creators of Lifesaver VR (www.lifesaverVR.org.uk) which has been shortlisted in the ‘Learning’ category of this year’s Children’s BAFTAs awards. Lifesaver VR invites people into a time-critical situation to make decisions while learning to save a life.
And backing him all the way is footie legend David Ginola who collapsed on a pitch in France and "died" for eight minutes before paramedics with defibs and four electric shocks brought him round. He subsequently need a quadruple by-pass and is a campaigner for life-saving promotion. (see picture of him performing CPR attached)
Andy said, “It is all rather surreal – as a doctor, I never thought I would ever become a BAFTA nominee. Clearly I would like to thank all of my family and friends as well as my non-existent agent and hope that I won’t need the ‘clapping with fixed smile’ approach on the night!”
Lifesaver VR is free to download on apple and android devices and is designed to teach effective CPR skills and provide people with the confidence to use them in an emergency situation. It is an engaging and immersive virtual reality film-in-a-game that allows the viewer to step into a life or death situation and learn crucial life-saving skills. It provides CPR instructions and feedback, and shows the ease of using a defibrillator to boost learning and confidence in saving lives. The app is suitable for everyone, but the teen-based scenario will appeal to young people in particular.
Andy has also recently published research (http://www.resuscitationjournal.com/article/S0300-9572(17)30335-0/fulltext) that shows that Lifesaver can be as effective as traditional face-to-face training for school children. The Virtual Reality version takes the training one step further in that the user can see themselves doing CPR and can look around themselves as well. It is all filmed with live action, not animation.
The BAFTA Children’s Awards will be held in London on Sunday 26 November 2017.
