EMT at an ER here. I want to share my favorite story. It's the only bonafide miracle I've ever witnessed. I can't say much out of respect for HIPAA, but I'll give the details I can.
Patient presents to the ER by EMS who by this point have been performing CPR for 15 minutes. Several rounds of heart-starting medicine have been given but this person's heart isn't moving except for compressions, and with no electrical activity. This is pretty much grounds for calling time of death on arrival to the hospital. The chances of surviving 10 minutes of CPR is very low. The chances of surviving 15 are even lower, and with brain damage all but guaranteed. Past 20 minutes and the statistics are rapidly approaching zero for anything but brain death. Everything past this is heroic measures that is more for the psychological healing of the patient's family than the patient.
But this person is an esteemed member of the community, is well known to our ER, and is friends with many of us and the EMS crew who brought them in. So we work on them.
We work on them for ~50 minutes.
Everyone is exhausted. We're rotating compressions with EMS because all of our arms are starting to give out. Roughly 20 rounds of adrenaline and other medicines. We got several shockable rhythms, but despite defibrillation we don't get a pulse.
Finally at ~75 total minutes of CPR we get a heart beat. The first heartbeat this person has had on their own for more than an hour.
Man, we work on them so fast after that. Heart drugs, blood pressure drugs, cooling therapy, the works.
I come back the next shift (4 days later) and he's awake, extubated, and talking.
I can't stress that enough. This motherfucker is talking. He's alive and having god damn conversations with only some extremity weakness and slowed, relatively simple speech when by every account he should be dead.
I have no explanation for this. He is beyond an outlier. This simply doesn't happen. The odds are so close to zero they are effectively are zero. If I hadn't been there pouring sweat doing CPR and seeing it for myself I wouldn't believe it.
And that man shook my (our) hand(s) when he was discharged.
Chills, man.