Don't worry about hurting during CPR
Medical professionals teach public how to perform life-saving CPR
Stewart Burnett
Northern News Services
Thursday, February 23, 2017
INUVIK
If someone's not breathing, you're never going to hurt them by performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).
Rob Holmes, Inuvik EMS paramedic, demonstrates CPR during a teaching session on Wednesday, Feb. 15. - Stewart Burnett/NNSL photo
|
"You're never going to do anything wrong," said John Moses, paramedic with Inuvik EMS, at a public demonstration last week teaching people how to perform mouth-less CPR.
"If the person isn't breathing, you're only going to be able to help them."
One of the fears people have about performing CPR is hurting the other person, he said.
"I can let anybody here do CPR (on me)," said Moses. "I might have a sore chest after but my heart, the way it functions, isn't going to be hurt."
He and other presenters were hoping to combat the bystander effect, in which people don't rush to the aid of another because they think they're not knowledgeable enough or otherwise, as well as prepare participants to perform CPR on loved ones while an ambulance is on the way.
John Hicks, community training coordinator with Advanced Medical Solutions, said that ambulances in major urban centres often take eight to 10 minutes to arrive.
"The problem is, once you stop breathing, in about four to six minutes you start getting brain damage," said Hicks. "That's where everyone in this room comes in."
The point of CPR, he continued, is to keep the patient's brain functioning long enough to prevent or reduce any long-term damage while paramedics are on the way.
The technique works by forcing the heart to pump blood and oxygen into the brain.
In November 2016, Moses and his partner were leaving the Inuvik Regional Hospital around 4 a.m. when they got an emergency call over the radio from a woman.
"She was really scared and really nervous," said Moses. "We heard something like, 'Help me, my boyfriend isn't breathing.'"
Luckily, Moses and his partner were already in uniforms and in an ambulance, so they were able to make it to the scene in two minutes, where they found the woman performing CPR on her loved one.
Moses then started performing CPR while his partner hooked up a defibrillator and shocked the patient to restart his heart.
"There's somebody walking around Inuvik breathing with no brain injury right now who would have been dead," he said, all thanks to the woman calling an ambulance and performing CPR while she waited.
"The most important thing you can do is get involved, and that's what that woman did," said Moses.
Dr. Roohina Virk, who works at the Inuvik Regional Hospital, said her team always asks if and when CPR has been done on patients that come in.
"The quicker that somebody gets to do CPR, the better," she said.
"It's the heroes out there who are getting onto those chests and doing CPR that make a huge difference on brain survivability."
After the presentation, participants got to practise their own CPR skills in groups on small dummies. A few more than a dozen people attended the event.
"There's always that one time you just might need it," said Gerry Kisoun.
