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| Audrey Schoeman survived a six-hour cardiac arrest |
A British woman says it was a "miracle" she was revived after her heart stopped for six hours when she was caught in a snowstorm.
Teacher Audrey Schoeman collapsed while out walking in the Spanish Pyrenees last month and developed hypothermia before going into cardiac arrest.
Mrs Schoeman, 53, who lives in Spain but has a British passport, started "talking nonsense" as her eyes rolled back into her head and she stopped breathing, her husband Rohan said.
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| Audrey Schoeman collapsed while out walking in the Spanish Pyrenees |
He added: "I thought she was dead.
"I was trying to feel a pulse... I couldn't feel a breath, I couldn't feel a heartbeat."
Mrs Schoeman was airlifted to hospital, where her temperature was recorded as 18C (64.4F) - less than half what it should have been. Doctors could also not find any vital signs.
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| Audrey Schoeman with the doctors that helped save her life |
Medics at the Vall d'Hebron Hospital in Barcelona said Mrs Schoeman had suffered the longest cardiac arrest ever recorded in Spain, calling it an "exceptional case".
Dr Eduard Argudo said: "She looked as though she was dead, but we knew that, in the context of hypothermia, Audrey had a chance of surviving."
Hypothermia, although causing her body to shut down, also meant her brain and organs had been protected.
Dr Argudo added: "If she had been in cardiac arrest for this long at a normal body temperature, she would be dead."
In hospital, she was put on a machine that removed her blood, re-oxygenated it, and then pumped it back into her body.
Then, once her body temperature had reached 30C (86F), she was switched to a defibrillator. It was then that her heart began working again, six hours after emergency services were called.
Speaking to local media, she said: "It's like a miracle except that it's all because of the doctors."
"Probably this winter, I won't go to the mountains, but I hope that in Spring we'll be able to start hiking again. I don't want this to take away that hobby."
Mrs Schoeman was discharged from hospital 12 days after being admitted.
