{"id":461851,"date":"2026-03-07T03:09:24","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T03:09:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/461851\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T03:09:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T03:09:24","slug":"i-had-a-cardiac-arrest-while-asleep-in-bed-but-lived-to-tell-the-tale-thanks-to-our-hero-dog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/461851\/","title":{"rendered":"‘I had a cardiac arrest while asleep in bed but lived to tell the tale thanks to our hero dog’"},"content":{"rendered":"

His life was saved thanks to the incredible instincts of his golden retriever barking to wake up his wife who performed CPR and phoned the emergency services\"Adam<\/p>\n

Adam Cooke with wife Hannah, son Alfie and dog Polly at the British Heart Foundation bench installed in living tribute to Adam, having survived a cardiac arrest two years ago.<\/p>\n

A Co Fermanagh runner who had a cardiac arrest and lived to tell the tale thanks to his hero dog has been honoured in a very special way.<\/p>\n

As previously reported by Belfast Live<\/a>, Adam Cooke had a cardiac arrest in March 2024 while asleep in bed but thanks to the incredible instincts of his golden retriever Polly, barking to wake up Adam\u2019s wife Hannah, who performed CPR and phoned the emergency services, his life was saved.<\/p>\n

Adam, 39 and from Ballinamallard<\/a>, a draughtsman for a steel company and keen runner, described that \u201cnormal\u201d Monday in March when he went to work and when he came home, went for his \u201cusual\u201d evening run.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: ‘My heart attack was a real shock after being fit and healthy all my life’<\/a>READ MORE: ‘My heart transplant has been an amazing gift of life’<\/a><\/p>\n

He recalled: \u201cHannah and I put our son Alfie, who was one at the time, to bed and then went to bed ourselves around 9.30pm. The next thing I remember was six days later, waking up in the cardiac ward in hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hannah, 33, was awoken around 12.45am by their dog Polly\u2019s barking, which was unusual during the night, so she checked the time on her phone.<\/p>\n

She said: \u201cPolly would bark the odd time if she hears anything as she sleeps in the kitchen which is directly below our bedroom. She\u2019s very in tune with Adam, and when she barks I usually turn to Adam to tell him. That\u2019s when I suddenly realised he was breathing very noisily.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I heard the noise Adam was making I sat bolt upright in bed as I previously worked as a carer and it hit me that it was the same noise I\u2019ve heard when people are taking their final breaths.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hannah rang the emergency services and they advised her to pull Adam off the bed and onto the floor immediately and start CPR.<\/p>\n

She continued: \u201cAdam is so much bigger than I am so I really don\u2019t know how I got the strength but I managed to roll him off the bed and the call handler talked me through CPR. He was amazing at keeping me focused on what I had to do, as I was completely terrified.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was giving Adam CPR, I could tell his whole body was fighting to come back. Sometimes he would open his eyes and I was shouting, this isn\u2019t your time to go. I knew he was meant to stay alive, it was fate.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Pictured<\/p>\n

Pictured alongside Adam and family are Fearghal McKinney, Head of British Heart Foundation, Councillor Shirley Hawkes, Vice Chair of Fermanagh and Omagh District Council and Parks Manager Stewart Burns<\/p>\n

After around seven minutes, the ambulance, community responder and two paramedics all arrived together and ran straight in to take over from Hannah who said: \u201cI collapsed outside the room in complete shock and a neighbour ran in and helped me.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe paramedics continued CPR and used a defibrillator to shock Adam back to life. My memory was they kept saying he was back and then they lost him again.\u201d<\/p>\n

The paramedics shocked Adam seven times in total between his house and the hospital before they could get his heart rate normalised.<\/p>\n

Adam was taken to ICU in the local hospital and Hannah mentions the \u201cindescribable relief\u201d that she and family<\/a> members felt when the doctor told them Adam had survived.<\/p>\n

Hannah said: \u201cPolly alerted me, possibly within seconds of Adam\u2019s cardiac arrest<\/a>, she was the first responder. Because of her, I was able to start CPR almost immediately. The paramedics and first responders were amazing, they arrived so quickly and took action immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n

Adam said: \u201cI have always been very fit<\/a>, running was a very important part of my life for over 20 years, and I took part in countless races from 5k distances up to multiple marathons. I was a member of Enniskillen<\/a> Running Club and Omagh<\/a> Harriers, I ran four or five times a week and did a bit of gym work.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy resting heart rate was usually around 38 \u2013 in the hospital after my cardiac arrest they said I had a heart rate of an Olympic athlete, and this worked in my favour for recovery.”<\/p>\n

\"Polly\u2019s<\/p>\n

Polly\u2019s barking woke Adam\u2019s wife Hannah who performed life-saving CPR and contacted the emergency services<\/p>\n

He continued: \u201cI remember going for the run on the Monday evening before my cardiac arrest and my next memory is almost a week later on the Sunday. I woke up in the hospital and the medical staff were all amazing at explaining everything but it felt very surreal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Adam was in hospital for three and a half weeks for monitoring and testing before an ICD (Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator) was fitted and he was discharged.<\/p>\n

He has since received a number of genetic tests and screening tests at Belfast City Hospital <\/a>where he has been given a diagnosis of dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) and will continue to have regular check-ups.<\/p>\n

DCM is a disease of your heart muscle which enlarges your heart\u2019s main pumping chamber (left ventricle), causing your heart\u2019s muscle wall to stretch and become thin (dilate). This makes it harder for your heart to pump blood out of your heart and around your body.<\/p>\n

In Northern Ireland<\/a>, there are more than 1,400 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests each year. Adam is one of the fewer than one in ten people who survive and now an iconic British Heart Foundation (BHF) red bench has been unveiled near Enniskillen Castle, to recognise him.<\/p>\n

\"Adam's<\/p>\n

Adam’s personalised plaque on the red bench situated at the foreground of Enniskillen Castle, along the Broadmeadow path<\/p>\n

Adam said: \u201cI\u2019m delighted that my bench has been placed in such a popular setting where many families visit regularly, as it is important to me that the bench is there for the community to use.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving a bench in my name means a lot to me as it\u2019s a reminder of how precious life is and how grateful I am for the care I\u2019ve received to give me a second chance at life as well as the importance of the research work that BHF does.\u201d<\/p>\n

To mark 65 years since BHF began, the charity is unveiling 65 red benches across the UK in tribute to those living with cardiovascular disease, including heart attacks.<\/p>\n

Behind every bench is a powerful real-life story of someone living with a cardiovascular condition \u2013 and thanks to research, they can survive to enjoy life with their loved ones.<\/p>\n

Want to see more of the stories you love from Belfast Live? Making us your preferred source on Google<\/a> means you\u2019ll get more of our exclusives, top stories and must-read content straight away. To add Belfast Live as a preferred source, simply click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"His life was saved thanks to the incredible instincts of his golden retriever barking to wake up his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":461852,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[27167,3016,5478,165836,2864,34489,59,102,1647,2205,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-461851","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-belfast-city-hospital","9":"tag-co-fermanagh","10":"tag-dogs","11":"tag-enniskillen","12":"tag-family","13":"tag-fitness-and-wellbeing","14":"tag-gb","15":"tag-health","16":"tag-northern-ireland","17":"tag-real-life","18":"tag-uk","19":"tag-united-kingdom","20":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461851\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/461852"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}