By Laura Albanese

February 19th, 2008

Newsday

The idea of bringing defibrillators to Long Island's sidelines came as a flash of inspiration to Craig and Kristin LoNigro, athletic trainers from Blue Point.

Craig LoNigro had been manning a Long Island Junior Soccer League tournament about three years ago when a player fractured his arm during the match. Afraid they would be held liable, the coaches told LoNigro to leave the boy alone and wait for an ambulance to come - which it did 35 minutes later.

"If this was a medical emergency, we would have been in bad shape," Craig LoNigro recalled saying to a coach. "I said, 'You know what, I'm going to do something about it.'"  He'd gone home later that day and told his wife about an idea to distribute defibrillators, known as automated external defibrillators or AEDs, to schools and athletic leagues in the area. With their training, he told her, they could instruct coaches - almost all volunteers - how to use the devices in the highly important few moments after a player's heart stops.

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