A defibrillator no one knows about saves no one. That is the whole point of the national AED database: to make every device findable, by emergency services and bystanders alike, at the moment when every second counts.
What the national AED database is
The national defibrillator database records all the AEDs installed across the country and centralises their information: location, accessibility, availability. It feeds the emergency services and the public-facing apps that, in the event of a cardiac arrest, direct a bystander to the nearest defibrillator. A declared, up-to-date AED becomes an active link in the chain of survival.
A mandatory declaration
Declaring your AED to the national database is not optional: the operator is required to register it there and to keep that information up to date. A move of the device, a change of access hours or a decommissioning must be reflected, on pain of making the database misleading, which is sometimes worse than no information at all.
What you declare
the exact location of the AED and the access conditions;
the hours during which it is available;
the model of the device and its manager;
any change of state: relocation, unavailability, return to service.
Why it matters in an emergency
During an emergency call, the medical dispatch can point the bystander to the nearest AED, provided the database is accurate. Reliable, geolocated data saves precious minutes. Conversely, a defibrillator that is quite real but absent from the database stays invisible to those who would need it.
The special role of local authorities
Local authorities are often the first managers of AEDs, in their sports, cultural, school or administrative facilities. They have a double interest in a reliable database: guaranteeing safety across their area, and having an overview of their fleet to steer its maintenance and renewal. Recording their own defibrillators and feeding the national database then become two sides of the same effort, as long as they are not treated as two separate tasks.
What changes when the data is reliable
An up-to-date database does not only benefit the emergency services. It lets the manager objectify the coverage of their area, spot poorly served zones, plan the installation of new devices where they are missing and justify those choices. The data stops being a duty endured and becomes a tool for steering public safety.
Who must declare, and how
The declaration falls to the operator of the AED, whether a local authority, a business or a private establishment. It is done with the national database, providing the characteristics of the device and its location. The process is simple for a single device, but quickly becomes heavy for a manager tracking dozens of AEDs across an area, especially when every change of location or hours has to be reflected.
Open data, reused by all
The information in the national database is open data: it is reused by the emergency services, by defibrillator-finder apps and by public health actors. This openness is what makes the database valuable, but it also raises the bar: false or stale data propagates to every reuser. Keeping your declaration up to date is therefore not an isolated administrative burden, it is a direct contribution to an emergency service.
Keep your declaration up to date with KARTES
KARTES AED was built to record, geolocate and track defibrillators, in line with the national database. You manage your fleet on a map, you track deadlines and checks, and you have clean, exportable data to feed and keep the national declaration up to date. Compliance and field usefulness move forward together.
Key points
The national database makes every AED findable by emergency services and the public.
The declaration and its updates are mandatory for the operator.
An accurate database saves decisive minutes in a cardiac arrest.
A managed, geolocated fleet makes a reliable, up-to-date declaration easier.
