How many of you lot know how to resusitate someone?

I was trained in CPR, recent medical research shows that chest compressions alone are just as effective as normal CPR so there's no need to do mouth to mouth any more.
 
wannabedamned said:
I do! I do! I do!

I learnt how as part of my Bronze Lifesavers award.

Does everyone know the recovery position aswell? for afterwards
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Recovery position in most cases would be instead of CPR, rather than after it.
In a drowning case you might be able to recussitate someone, in most cardiac arrest situation you will never 'revive' them, you maintain life support until someone arrives with a defibrillator and revives them. Hopefully. Usually without success.
 
mingeroonie said:
If CPR fails, I usually find that thumping the chest dramatically and shouting Fight! Fight! Damn You! works quite well.
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Oddly, if someone collapses right in front of you, and a defib machine is miles away then a couple of hard sternal blows might just help. Precordial thump, not taught anymore, but if they collapse right in front and you know its a cardiac arrest, like an electric shock event or similar, then I'd do the thumps first, and then maintain basic life support until help arrived.
 
I did a St. John's Ambulance First Aid course back in High School and got a 3 star certificate. I can remember bits and pieces but it's hazy.
 
On my first aid course the paramedic told us all that simple regular chest compressions on their own were almost as good as anything, if its true it should be a standard as it'd be very hard for anyone to forget that short procedure
 
Lakeland said:
Rather than just keep them occupied, I was led to believe that you're simply keeping their blood/brain oxygenated, but as you say, it's hardly ever effective there and then (circa 5-10%?) other than stopping brain damage until the paramedics arrive.
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Basically that hits the nail on the head. Without CPR, unless the paramedics can get there within 2 to 3 minutes the chances are brain damage will be significant. I have had many instances in my wider family where the medics arrived in seven or eight minutes and got someone's heart going. But the difference between whether there was any point in that or not was always whether someone had been providing CPR until they arrived. Where it was not provided both died in ITU around a week later. Where it was, all three were out of hospital within a week and have survived for at least three years afterward.
 
vonhelmet said:
I also know that it's barely ever successful, and that some people in the emergency services regard it as something to keep people at accidents occupied while they wait for the professionals, so they don't just panic and freak out.
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To clarify a little bit. May get a little long winded here but always useful to know! Essentially the bloods job (in this case) is to transport oxygen all around the body and especially to the brain. Therefore, in an adult where the cause of heart failure is most likely to have been a heart attack one assumes that prior to the attack the lungs were working fine. Therefore, there is sufficient oxygen already in the blood to keep the brain "alive" if you keep some sort of movement going. This is why the compression rate increased recently to 30 times as a smaller amount meant you never really built up a pressure as you were stopping and starting and losing all your built up momentum in the blood flow. Now this will in now way restart the heart for that you wait until you can give the patient defib + drugs to get the heart in a normal rhythm.

Now the big difference comes in children. Here heart attacks only really happen to children with pre-existing heart conditions or say problems with potassium due to say kidney problems. What causes the heart to stop in children is low oxygen supply to the heart due to breathing failures. Therefore , the rescue breathes are very important in children as it is the oxygen you need to get to the heart to get it working again. What you will see if a child is monitored is their breathing stopping then their oxygen levels dropping then their heart rate dropping. To rectify this you reverse that.

So in adults yes you keep perfusion going till the emergency services arrives but in children you can save that life there and then before they even arrive.
 
I always carry a few poppers of amyl nitrate on me, so I suppose I could use that to resuscitate someone if I needed to.
 
Medic first aid and o2 administrator here although I've not had the refresher course you're supposed to go on for many a year now.

15 to 2... Check pulse
Rinse and repeat until something changes.
 
been a first aider with wallace and cameron for the past 13 years.

it's all stuck in my head now but never had to use any of it.

just the odd cut and sprain over the years.
 
Scubascorpion said:
Medic first aid and o2 administrator here although I've not had the refresher course you're supposed to go on for many a year now.

15 to 2... Check pulse
Rinse and repeat until something changes.
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As mentioned several times, 30:2 is now what is considered standard.

Oh - Also a first aider.
 
Von Smallhausen said:
Know CPR, recovery position and treatment of cuts, abrasions, lacerations arterial bleeds, missing limbs and gunshots and was trained in use of a defrib although the latter authorisation has ran out now.

Top tip. Tampons make excellent initial dressings on a gunshot wound.
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As above and refreshed annually.
 
it'd probably be a bit rusty (it was a few years ago i learned and without regular people to practise on i doubt i'm as able to as i was) but i do know how, i'm sure if the need was there i'd just go in to auto pilot.
 
Being a Paramedic, I would say I do. Must admit though, I had far better save rate as a EMT on cardiac arrest, and that's the same attitude that most of the service has. The biggest recent change for us has been the ability to call it a day after 20 minutes of trying.

If anyone wants the recent changes and the current guidelines go here :

http://www.resus.org.uk/pages/guide.htm which is the official Resuscitation Council UK.
 
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