Former yellow Wiggle Greg Page has paid tribute to the nurse who saved his life in a speech at a University of Newcastle event on Friday to mark International Nurses Day.
"Every day I'm just grateful to be alive," Mr Page told the Newcastle Herald.
The performer had a "massive heart attack" and cardiac arrest at a Sydney reunion concert for bushfire aid in January 2020.
Nurse Grace Jones was in the audience, watching the show.
When Mr Page collapsed, she sprung to action and performed CPR on him with the help of Wiggles drummer Steve Pace.
She then used a defibrillator that was at the Castle Hill RSL venue, where the incident occurred in front of the crowd and online via a live stream.
"The fact that Grace was there as one of the respondents that saved my life is incredible. She came along to watch a Wiggles concert, never expecting she'd end up saving one of the Wiggle's lives that night," he said.
"Every nurse plays an important part in our community. Until you experience the care they give, you do tend to take it for granted.
"But there are people doing this work day in and day out. They're human beings, too. Their work has an impact on them personally and emotionally. And the work they do is so valuable."
Mr Page said he doesn't forget that "I nearly lost my life that night".
He was rushed to hospital, where he had surgery to insert a stent for a blocked artery.
"I have six kids and two granddaughters now that I got to see born," he said.
"I hug my kids that little bit tighter now and tell them I love them. You just don't know what's around the corner."
His heart disease was undiagnosed before "that moment when I dropped dead".
"Ninety per cent of people don't survive a sudden cardiac arrest," he said.
Mr Page said he had "always lived a relatively healthy lifestyle".
"I've always exercised a lot. I guess that's where I partly went wrong with my mentality of thinking I could eat some of the unhealthy foods because I exercise, burn it off and keep the blood moving through the arteries.
"But it doesn't work that way."
He said he was overweight and eating a bad diet at times before his heart attack.
"Prior to my cardiac arrest, my wife would say 'don't have so many sausages tonight on the barbecue, don't have the chicken skin on the chicken'."
He now heeds that advice, saying "I might not get a second chance".
"I've made lifestyle modifications where I can, but you've got to do that in balance. I don't want to change everything and not enjoy life, but I want to live longer.
"I implore people to look after your heart, but enjoy life the best you can because you only get one life."
Mr Page said the best thing about being a Wiggle was "getting to do what you love every single day".
"That is, making music for kids and seeing them enjoy that, whether that be on CDs and DVDs or live concert performances, where you could see the joy on the faces of people.
"You can't help but love that and think life is an amazing thing, a blessing. To think you've had a positive impact on people's lives and brought them some joy is so good."
The worst thing about being a Wiggle, he said, was "travelling and being away from home".
"That wasn't conducive to a healthy lifestyle sometimes.
"It was a lot of time spent on stage, backstage and in hotel rooms, not being able to get the kind of exercise you need, not getting access to good food sometimes and making unhealthy choices because they were the easy choices."
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