According to the American Heart Association (http://www.americanheart.org/), October is Sudden Cardiac Awareness Month.  So here is some of the basic information that they offer about CPR, which is short for “cardiopulmonary resuscitation”. 

• Sudden cardiac arrest is most often caused by ventricular fibrillation (VF)--an abnormal heart rhythm.
• Cardiac arrest can also occur after the onset of a heart attack or as a result of electrocution or near-drowning.
• Recognizing the signs: When sudden cardiac arrest occurs, the victim collapses, becomes unresponsive to gentle shaking, stops normal breathing and after two rescue breaths, still isn’t breathing normally, coughing or moving.
• Death from sudden cardiac arrest is not inevitable. If more people knew CPR, more lives could be saved.
• About 80 percent of all cardiac arrests (outside of a hospital) occur at home, so being trained to perform CPR can mean saving the life of a loved one.
•  Effective CPR, provided immediately after cardiac arrest, can double a victim’s chance of survival.
• CPR helps maintain vital blood flow to the heart and brain and increases the amount of time that an electric shock from a defibrillator can be effective.
• Brain death starts to occur four to six minutes after someone experiences cardiac arrest if no CPR and defibrillation occurs during that time.
• If bystander CPR is not provided, a sudden cardiac arrest victim’s chances of survival fall 7 percent to 10 percent for every minute of delay until defibrillation.
• There are 294,851 emergency medical services-treated out-of-hospital cardiac arrests annually in the United States.

Learning CPR can give your loved one time to receive needed immediate care in a hospital Emergency Department and be seen by a NOHC Cardiologist.  NOHC provides state-of-the-art cardiology services. However, we believe that “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”. Come to our heart center (http://www.nohc.com/) so we can help you prevent the need for emergency services.