Drones with defibrillators could save lives before the ambulance arrives

In the perhaps not-so-distant future, drones could be first responders.

That's the conclusion from a report published Tuesday by the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) following a simulated study involving drones carrying defibrillators in Sweden.

Researchers for the study equipped an eight-rotor drone from the Swedish Transportation Agency with a GPS system, a camera and a defibrillator for several out-of-sight test flights in October 2016. 

Their aim: to find out if life-saving equipment like the defibrillator could be dispatched to a person in cardiac arrest outside a hospital more quickly with a drone than with a traditional emergency response unit. They made some hopeful discoveries. Read more...