CPR Saves Lives

"More than 92% of people who suffer from cardiac arrest outside the hospital will die from it."   (American Heart Association) 

That's a shocking statistic! Do you know the reason that those 92% will die? Most bystanders are afraid to react  because they are afraid they will administer CPR incorrectly.

Luckily, The American Heart Association has implemented a new type of  CPR, Hands Only CPRTM. 

Hands-OnlyTM CPR is CPR without mouth-to-mouth breaths. It is recommended for use by people who see an adult suddenly collapse in the “out-of-hospital” setting (like at home, at work, in a park). It consists of two steps:

• 1) Call 911 (or send someone to do that).
• 2) Begin providing high-quality chest compressions by pushing hard and fast in the center of the chest with minimal interruptions.

This type of CPR is recommended for use on teens or adults (anyone over the age of 8) whom you witness suddenly collapse.

Why don’t adults who suddenly collapse need mouth-to-mouth breathing in the first few minutes after their cardiac arrest? 

When an adult suddenly collapses with cardiac arrest, their lungs and blood contain enough oxygen to keep vital organs healthy for the first few minutes, as long as someone provides high quality chest compressions with minimal interruption to pump blood to the heart and brain.

• When an adult suddenly collapses with cardiac arrest, the cause is usually an electrical malfunction, an abrupt onset of an abnormal heart rhythm. The most common abnormal rhythm causing sudden cardiac arrest is ventricular fibrillation (VF). VF causes the heart to quiver so it does not pump blood. Before a sudden collapse, the adult was probably breathing normally. At the time of a sudden collapse, the adult's lungs and blood are likely to have a fresh supply of oxygen that can last for at least a few minutes even if breathing stops.
• Consider when you hold your breath while floating in a pool. Most people can hold their breath for quite a while, as long as they are not moving.
• Another reason that breaths may not be needed during the first minutes after collapse is that a person in cardiac arrest needs less oxygen than a person who is not in cardiac arrest.
• For these reasons, the most important thing a bystander can do for a person in sudden cardiac arrest is to pump blood to the brain and to the heart muscle, delivering the oxygen that still remains in the lungs and blood. A rescuer can do this by giving high-quality chest compressions with minimal interruptions. Interruptions in compressions to give breaths (mouth-to-mouth breaths) may bring some additional oxygen to the lungs but the benefit of that oxygen can be offset if you stop the blood flow to the brain and heart muscle for more than a few seconds (especially in the first few minutes after a sudden cardiac arrest when there is still plenty of oxygen in the lungs and blood).

How do you perform Hands Only CPR?