Mitchell, SD – A Mitchell family is lucky to be alive after suffering carbon monoxide poisoning.
Allan Miller woke up before his 5 a.m. alarm Monday as usual. But when he got out of bed, his usual routine went awry.
“When I swung my legs over the bed, that’s when I started getting dizzy. I thought I was having a heart attack,” Allan told The Daily Republic earlier this week.
With the feeling that he may need to go to the emergency room, he woke up his wife, Laura. She got up to get Allan’s blood pressure cuff but collapsed in the hallway.
“That’s when I had a strong idea something was affecting us both,” he said.
Allan, who works as an emergency manager for the South Dakota Department of Public Safety, called 911, and then he got his wife and their two girls outside.
Mitchell Fire Division Captain Mark Eliason said firefighters and an ambulance crew arrived on scene just after 5 a.m. to find three of four family members outside.
Due to privacy laws, Eliason did not reference the Millers by name during an interview about the incident.
“There was still a guy in the house collecting a phone and some other items, so we got him out right away,” Eliason said.
Allan didn’t remember being in the house, he said. After getting Laura and his girls out of the house, he doesn’t remember any details about what happened until he was receiving medical attention in the ambulance.
When firefighters entered the home, Eliason said the carbon monoxide detector readings immediately rose.
“They got as high as 600 parts per million on the main floor, and in the lower level it was as high as 300 parts per million,” Eliason said. “To give you some perspective, when it hits 35 parts per million, that’s when we as firefighters start tanking up (for protection).”
He said at 600 parts per million, exposure for less than an hour can cause death.
“They were really, really fortunate to get out of that house,” Eliason said.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 400 people in the United States die annually from carbon monoxide poisoning not related to fire. The CDC reports more than 20,000 people visit the emergency room and 4,000 are hospitalized annually with incidents related to carbon monoxide poisoning.
There were no carbon monoxide detectors in the house, Allan said. They once had a detector, but it stopped working, and they threw it away and never replaced it.
“It’s not one you think about every day,” Allan said.
Neither the family nor professionals know how long the Millers were exposed to carbon monoxide, but Laura and Allan believe it could go back as far as November.
Laura started getting headaches that turned into severe migraines over a few months.
After they were evacuated from the house Monday, the Millers were taken to Avera Queen of Peace Hospital in Mitchell for treatment. They arrived at the hospital about 5:30 a.m., Allan said, and didn’t leave until about 3 p.m. They all received oxygen until the carbon monoxide was out of their systems.
Allan had a carbon monoxide level of 31 percent in his blood and Laura was at 28. The couple’s 14-year-old daughter Mackenzie had a level of 24, and 18-year-old Allison had a level of 17. Carbon monoxide naturally occurs in the body, but at much lower levels, according to the University of Rochester, N.Y., Medical Center. The normal level of carbon monoxide in an adult is 2.3 percent.
Laura said her headaches are now gone.
“I haven’t had one now since Monday,” Laura said.
Eliason said the possible cause for the carbon monoxide leak was a damper in the gas boiler.
He said the only items in a house that produce carbon monoxide are fossil fuel-burning appliances, like boilers, water heaters, stove or a gas heater.
“If you’re concerned about carbon monoxide, you should put a carbon monoxide detector in your house,” Eliason said.
The Millers have now installed carbon monoxide detectors on the lower and the main levels of their home.
Detectors need to be maintained just like smoke detectors — regularly change batteries and test once a month. There’s no rule on where to have carbon monoxide detectors, but outside a room with a gas appliance is a good start, he said.
Carbon monoxide is the same as air — colorless, odorless, tasteless and there is no way to detect it without a carbon monoxide detector.
“Our main message is to go buy a detector,” Laura said. “If you have them, check the batteries and make sure they are not more than 10 years old.”