A 911 Response Guide for College Students
Would you feel 100 percent confident in responding to a friend who is in danger of an overdose on alcohol or drugs? With over 1,700 students dying from alcohol related incidents each year, ERICA UPSHAW strives to educate students on how to respond in these situations to hopefully reduce this very preventable number.
While in college, Erica went through a life-changing experience that fueled her mission to empower friends to act when they see a dangerous incident or pattern of irresponsible substance abuse in their friends.
Her brother, Joey Upshaw, attended university the same time as Erica and they went to the same social functions. However, since they studied hard and were high-achieving students academically, they used the weekends as an excuse to party hard. Joey died tragically from an incident in which he mixed alcohol and party drugs.
Erica explains the ABC’s of 911—how to recognize the dangerous signs and how to respond during an alcohol overdoes situation—by detailing the timeline of her brother’s death.
1:00 AM—YOUR FRIEND TAKES/DRINKS SOMETHING
Joey ingests a drug called GHB on the back porch of a party being held at his fraternity house. He is already drunk after a night of heavy drinking. He is with his friends.
1:30 AM—YOUR FRIEND COLLAPSES
Joey is walking down the hall inside the fraternity house and collapses against a wall and falls to the ground unconscious. His friends, not knowing any better, put him to bed to “sleep it off.”
If a friend had collapsed in broad daylight, would you put your friend to bed? NO, this is serious. Call 911.
2:00 AM—YOUR FRIEND WON’T WAKE UP
A friend checks on Joey, but cannot wake him by pushing him or shouting his name. He leaves the room not thinking much of it.
If you cannot wake your friend or get any response, call 911.
YOU FRIEND ISN’T BREATHING NORMALLY
At this point, Joey was most likely breathing abnormally, but his friend didn’t know to check for this.
If your friend is breathing slowly, and there are more than 10 seconds between each breath, call 911.
2:30 AM—YOUR FRIEND HAS CLAMMY OR BLUISH SKIN
Another friend decides to check on Joey, and when he walks in the door, he sees that Joey’s lips are blue. He freaks out and calls a bunch of friends into the room to check out the situation. Instead of calling 911 right away, they argue about what to do. “Should we call 9-1-1? But Joey would be mad! We don’t want to get in trouble, neither would he! What do we do?!”
As soon as you notice something is wrong, call 911.
3:00 AM—YOUR FRIEND VOMITS UNCONSCIOUSLY
Joey starts vomiting unconsciously, and a friend decides enough is enough and finally calls 911. Joey reaches the hospital soon after, but it’s too late. Joey is dead.
Erica urges, when in doubt, call 911 and help keep friendship alive by adopting these simple strategies to know when someone you care about is in danger.
“If you just pay attention to what’s going on around you and really trust your instincts you will do the right thing,” states Erica.
Erica is a great speaker for National Collegiate Alcohol Awareness Week in the fall, first year experience and fraternity and sorority life programming. Erica will challenge students to openly question behavior in their social scene that many know to be abusive and potentially fatal, in a friendly and approachable manner.
Check out campuspeak.com/upshaw to learn more about Erica and her keynote, Keep Friendship Alive.
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