Carly Ryan's decision to take home a defibrillator saved her mother's life (9News)
Carly Ryan's decision to take home a defibrillator saved her mother's life. (9News)
It was a split-second decision on her last day of work that nobody ever could have predicted would save her mother's life.
Carly Ryan, a regional manager at the Royal Life Saving Society and sister of ex-football star Beau Ryan, was heading out the door of her office to go on leave when she decided on a whim to grab the defibrillator from the wall, given it had would have no use in a locked building over the Christmas break.
She put in in the boot of her car and drove home, giving it no more thought.
That was until the early hours on January 14, when she awoke to the nightmare of her father Kym screaming for her upstairs.
Her mother Robyn, a fit and healthy 63-year-old grandmother with no pre-existing medical problems, had woken complaining of chest pains before abruptly going into sudden cardiac arrest.