'I brought my colleague back from the dead'

A car saleswoman told today of the moment she saved a colleague's life - three weeks after receiving first aid training at work.

Christina Paterson, 23, rushed to the calls of her co-workers to find that 54-year-old car valet Andrzej Derlatko had suffered a heart attack.

"Everybody was shouting 'call an ambulance' and saying he was dead. He certainly looked dead. He was lying on his back in a puddle, with his mouth open. He'd swallowed his tongue. He'd gone cold and blue. Everybody was crying but I thought 'there's still a chance'," said Ms Paterson, who works at a Mercedes Benz dealership in Edgware Road.

"During my training I had learned that when your heart stops, the oxygen can still live in your blood for four to six minutes - and then you're dead. He hadn't been breathing for five minutes so I realised I had one minute left to try to keep him alive.

"I thought 'if I give him mouth-to-mouth, he might have a chance'."

Miss Paterson recalled her Red Cross training and performed mouth-to-mouth and cardio-pulmonary resuscitation for seven minutes until paramedics arrived. "It was violent, strenuous and exhausting, and I thought there was still no sign of life at all. I broke down in absolute hysterics - I thought I'd been working on a dead man," she said. "And then one of the paramedics said: 'What you have done today has saved this man's life.' I burst into tears, I was so happy.

"Just the day before, we'd had a conversation about his family - and I couldn't stop thinking that he'd be leaving his daughter and grandchildren behind- I had to save him."

Mr Derlatko was taken to hospital and after spending two days in a coma had surgery to replace a blocked heart valve.

Now recovering at his home in Hanwell, he said: "I'm so thankful and grateful to Christina, her courage was amazing. She reacted so quickly. I went back to work yesterday to thank everybody. I wanted to show everybody that I was still alive."

His daughter Katarzyna, a trainee nurse, said: "Christina is an angel, she's amazing. She saved my father's life. I think that first aid training should be compulsory and the Government should fund courses."

Miss Paterson added: "My family, friends and my colleagues all want the training. Everyone at work just stood back and watched and now they've realised how important it is."

The saleswoman, from Elstree, has recently returned to work after suffering post traumatic stress disorder.