Hairdresser comes to rescue

JOHN HAWKINS/Southland Times

LEGEND: Quiffs For Hair owner Noelle McPherson with a client at her Salford St Shopping Centre salon yesterday.

Relevant offers

An Invercargill hairdresser's concern for a 93-year-old client who failed to make her weekly appointment might have helped save the woman's life.

The woman suffered a heart attack this month, collapsing on her floor where she lay for several hours. She was unable to press her St John alert and it is unknown how long she laid on the floor.

A family member visits daily but was not expected to arrive until later in the afternoon.

Hairdresser Noelle McPherson, of Quiffs, realised her elderly client of seven years had missed her regular appointment and popped around to check.

The woman usually walked to her appointments but sometimes Mrs McPherson would pick her up.

"It was such a windy day I thought I'd go and get her. When I got there the paper was on the doorstep. I rang the doorbell but there was no answer. So I came back to work. But then I thought 'no, something's wrong'.

"I went back to the house and saw the drapes around the back were still pulled and so I called the police."

The police broke in and found the elderly woman on the floor. They pressed the St John alarm and got an ambulance.

The woman's daughter said Mrs McPherson had looked after her mother for many years, picking her up when it was windy and raining.

"She gives us peace of mind and we're so grateful that she had the initiative when Mum hadn't answered the phone or the door to ring the police and get her to hospital."

"It's good to know that kind of caring goes on for the elderly in the community."

The woman is now recovering in hospital, her daughter said.

- © Fairfax NZ News