A study of cardiac arrest deaths linked to automated external defibrillators (AEDs) found that nearly a quarter of them were due to dead batteries in the devices.
Researchers led by Dr. Lawrence DeLuca of the University of Arizona’s Department of Emergency Medicine found that 23% of the 1,150 AED-related fatalities that occurred over a 15-year time span were due to battery failure, while 24% were attributed to problems with pads and connectors.