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In summer of 2025, Michele Acosta was woken up by a sound from her husband, Rob, who was in bed next to her. Michele knew that Rob had leg cramps that woke him up at night, so a groan or gasp wasn’t unfamiliar. However, on this morning, she checked on him only to find him not breathing. Immediately, Michele, who spent years working as a nurse at Belton Regional Medical Center, began CPR – calling out to her sister, Danette, to call 9-1-1.

“All I kept saying was ‘Don’t die on me! Don’t go to the light!’,” Michele said while recounting the June morning when she woke up to her husband in cardiac arrest. For 6 minutes, Michele preformed life-saving compressions until Belton paramedics arrived. Together, EMS moved Rob to the living room to work on him. There, they used an AED (Automated External Defibrillator) to shock Rob’s heart.

Statistics from the American Heart Association show that, if performed immediately, CPR can double or triple the chance of survival from an out of hospital cardiac arrest. Use of an AED further increases those odds, and Rob was one such case.

Over the next 45 minutes, Rob would be shocked 5 times, hooked up to a Lucas machine, which provides robotic chest compressions, and transported to local emergency room. There, nurses and doctors administered life-saving care. For four days, Rob was unconscious in the ICU with his wife at his side.

“It was so scary, not knowing – they had him hooked up to an EEG to monitor his brain to see if there was activity to know if they would continue care,” Michele described, while looking back through photos from those days. “Everything was normal, he just had to wake up.”

For days, Michele and their daughter, Brenna, waited to see what would happen when Rob came back to them, and finally, he woke up.

“You’re a miracle,” Michele told him. “Too stubborn to die,” Rob responded.

Rob and Michele shared a laugh, making light of the scary situation. Rob had lost days of time – as far as he knew, he went to bed after a long day of working outside, and woke up one week later with no idea what happened. He had broken ribs from chest compressions and burns on his chest, but he was alive. Within a week, he was starting rehabilitation.

Despite the cardiac arrest, an implanted defibrillator, two strokes, and several broken ribs, Rob was positive – he could walk and talk like normal and didn’t feel much differently than before his cardiac event. Despite feeling fine, Rob was prescribed Cardiac Rehab so he could work on keeping his heart strong.

“Cardiac Rehab makes you slow down and focus on your health. It gives you time to focus on getting better and respecting your health,” Michele said.

Now, Rob attends Cardiac Rehab three days a week at Cass Regional Medical Center, and is steadily moving through his rehab process. “I don’t feel weak, I don’t feel tired – my health feels the same as before,” Rob said.

Terry Johns, RN, BSN, Cardiac Rehabilitation Manager says Rob’s story is remarkable. “Michele’s quick CPR made a huge difference in Rob’s outcome, and he’s made great progress. His METs [Metabolic Equivalents] have doubled.”

METs are how Terry and her team measure energy used during exercise, and decide progress. He’s now exercising for 60 minutes instead of 30 and is doing weight training exercise.

“Rehab is so important for someone who’s had a cardiac event, because it reduces the risk of future problems,” said Terry. “But it also gets patients back to an independent life. We’ve had patients with goals like walking to their mailbox, and we get them there.”

“We’re grateful for everyone and everything, everybody has been so friendly and helpful,” Michele said. “Everything that could go wrong did, but everything that could go right, did too.”

The Cass Regional Medical Center Cardiac Rehabilitation Department offers medically-supervised program for individuals with coronary artery disease and for those who are recovering from a heart attack, heart surgery, stent placement, valve replacement, congestive heart failure, left ventricular assist device (LVAD) implantation or heart transplant. This program includes structured, monitored and progressive physical activity as well as educational classes for modifying cardiac risk factors. This helps speed the patient's return to a productive life. To ensure that our staff are meeting the standards of care in rehabilitation, our cardiac rehabilitation program is certified by the American Association of Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation