American Heart Month: Local boxer reveals how teammates saved his life with CPR

ALLEN, TX (CBSNewsTexas.com) — Isaiah Creighton loves health, doing cardio boxing at The Jym in Allen several times a week. But in August, a routine class workout turned into a mission to save his life.

“I don’t think we know how precious life is until it’s almost been taken from us,” Creighton said. “I was doing uppercuts on the bag and that’s the last thing I remember, and then I woke up in the hospital.”

He collapsed.

His heart stopped beating.

Two classmates came to the rescue and performed artificial respiration until the ambulance arrived. Creighton’s wife, Wandelka, says she was stunned when she received the call.

“I just couldn’t believe it because Isaiah is seemingly a healthy man. He works out all the time and you don’t expect to get a phone call like that,” she said.

But it can and does happen. This happened to Buffalo Bills player Damar Hamlin just last month. CPR also saved his life.

“If you don’t have effective CPR within 10 minutes, you have less than a 5% chance of meaningful survival,” said Dr. Dale Yu, Creighton Cardiologist-Electrophysiologist at Texas Health Allen.

“I always like to talk about [the] outside of our bodies, it doesn’t always tell what’s going on inside,” Dr. Yu said.

In Creighton’s case, Dr. Yu is still not 100% sure of the cause.

“He may have been more dehydrated that day, he may have had low potassium levels, he may have had electrolyte problems, he may not have eaten well the night before – things he didn’t even think could cause or lead to this moment,” he said. “But when you take all these factors and put them in a cauldron…it can lead to a vulnerable window.”

While what caused Creighton’s heart to stop is still a mystery, there is no doubt why he is alive today.

“If they hadn’t done CPR while the paramedics were on the way, my brain would have been dead,” he said.

Now he is back in fighting form and says he will always be grateful to his classmates for his second chance at life.

“I saw them on two different occasions and was just grateful,” Creighton said. “I hugged them and thanked them. I mean, I bought coffee. I know it’s not much, but how do you repay someone for saving your life?”

For information on earning CPR certification, please visit the following links:

American Red Cross CPR Training

American Heart Association CPR and First Aid