Winthrop-University hospital employee honored for saving life

Bryan Ahrens

Jeffrey Brenner was attending a presentation of “White Christmas” at the Engeman Theater in Northport last December when he said his skills as an EMT were put to the test.

The Winthrop-University Hospital EMT said he heard that someone was unconscious in the lobby and went to help.

“He wasn’t breathing, I rolled him over and began CPR,” Brenner said.

Brenner said it wasn’t until police arrived with a defibrillator that he was able to revive the man, Emily Esposito, who was a bartender at the theater.

“I shocked him and got a heart rate,” he said. “He was sent off with medication to the hospital and recovered very well.”

Brenner, who works as a hyperbaric medical technician at Winthrop, was honored for saving the bartender’s life on Nov. 24 during a “Feast for Heroes” on Nov. 24 at the Garden City Hotel.

But did not think he did anything special.

“I simply stepped in to do what I have been trained to do,” he said.

Brenner, 27, said his training and history as an EMT allowed him to act quickly.

Brenner, a Hungtinton resident who is an employee with the Life Support Technologies Group in Tarrytown, said he was attending the presentation as the stage supervisor in charge of props and scenery as well as the safety of each person on the set.

Since last year, Brenner has been the recipient of awards including the American Heart Association’s Louis J. Acampora Heart Saver Award, which he received on Sept. 23 and the Suffolk County, REMSCO BLS Life Saver of the Year Award on Nov. 6 before being honored on Nov. 24, according to a release issued by Life Support Technologies.

“Jeffrey’s quick response to a medical emergency while he was enjoying a theater show saved someone’s life,” Lenn Butler, Life Support Technologies’ founder and CEO, said in the release. “We’re honored to have Jeffrey Brenner, and many other dedicated EMS volunteers, working with us in our hyperbaric medical units.”

Brenner said he has been a volunteer EMT for the Hungtington Communty First Aid Squad for nearly 10 years, an organization with which he has been affiliated since the age of 14 as a member of Explorers Post 215.

He said volunteering for Huntington, where he was born and raised, is a tradition in his family.

“I am a fifth generation volunteer,” he said. “There are currently six of us volunteering.”

He and his family members combined have contributed approximately 150 years of EMS service, the release said.

“I hope that I have made a real difference in my town in the world around me to help prevent death and improve the quality of people’s lives,” Brenner said.

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