No. This is not about the song.This is about those times when you have the Fray on the radio singing, “Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend…” and suddenly, you literally have a friend or a relative (or anybody significant to you, work with me here) who goes into sudden cardiac arrest.
“…I would have stayed up with you all night, had I known how to save a life.” Sure, this pop rock song from The Fray is not exactly the song you want playing during a time like that (think, something older, like more the Bee Gees’ Stayin’ Alive) but it does open up the article nicely in the sense that if you do know CPR or cardiopulmonary resuscitation, the life you save could be that of someone you love.
Statistically, the highest number of deaths attributable to cardiac causes rises during and right after the holidays. No wonder, they call it a Merry Coronary Christmas, or a Happy Heart Attack Hanukkah.
And surely, this comes after you binged on all that lechon, cakes, fruitcakes, and followed it up with paksiw, humba, and all those mouth-watering delectable Filipino Christmas specialties.
Yes, I’m sure you feel it slowly clogging your coronary arteries. Not only does the cuisine do you in, but the cuddle, and bed weather can narrow your arteries as well, adding to the cardiovascular compromise.
There are so many factors that go into why cardiac deaths rise during these days, but that is not the point of this writeup.
You see, most of these attacks happen at home. Approximately 70 to 80 percent of all out-of-hospital cardiac arrests happen in households.
Of these cardiac arrest victims, 90 percent die before ever reaching the hospital. Death does not have to be a foregone conclusion for these patients because if more people knew CPR, more lives would be saved.
CPR involves providing compressions to promote perfusion and breaths to provide ventilation.
For those who survive, another fact to consider is that brain death occurs as early as five minutes after cardiac arrest. There is no effective blood reaching the brain and the cells die unless CPR is done.
If you do witness someone collapsing, and you know and apply timely CPR, the chances for survival double or even triple.
Like the previous column, this does not aim to instruct you on how to do CPR. But we do urge everyone to get certified, and learn basic resuscitation techniques as given by the Philippine Heart Association, fully accredited by the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation. The PHA arm for advancing resuscitation are cardiologists who take it upon themselves to educate everyone on the merits of CPR.
Several instructional videos have surfaced on the internet — one with the unflappable Vinnie Jones and the hilarious Ken Jeong being one of my favorites — you look them up — and even children, adorably practicing their compressions on practice dummies. So if they can do it, why can’t everybody?
It is the aim of the Philippine Heart Association and modern healthcare, as a whole, to have a self-sufficient society educated to the merits of CPR in emergency situations.
Do not worry about the “yuck” factor. Not all cardiac arrest victims are matinee idols and FHM ladies, no, but the fear of doing mouth-to-mouth on a total stranger turns people away from giving effective emergency care.
Cardiology societies, including our own, are in agreement that giving chest compressions take importance over rescue breathing.
In fact, several studies have found that interrupting chest compressions to give rescue breaths is actually detrimental to the victim’s survival.
Since 2010, there has been a push for a simplified version of bystander CPR.
When in a situation where a person has collapsed and is unresponsive, the most important emergency action, after calling for help or 911, is to provide rapid, forceful chest compressions until medical help arrives, or when an automated external defibrillator becomes available to shock the heart back into a normal rhythm.
Again, look at the numbers. Almost 900 people die every day because of sudden cardiac arrest. Ninety five percent of people who have sudden cardiac arrest die before reaching the hospital, with many of these victims otherwise healthy. Chances of survival fall by seven to 10 percent every minute the heart fails to pump (imagine 10 minutes without quality CPR, a victim is as good as gone!)
Eighty percent of these events occur at home, where there is only you and your relatives. You can save them, or they can save you. And timely enough during these times when we are just clearing our refrigerators of the leftovers from the holidays.
Sure, we have the rest of the year to lose all that holiday flab, and go dieting, exercise, but part of that New Year’s resolution could be to include a peek at CPR instructional videos or better yet, getting certified.
Be the difference for someone you love — learn CPR. You can actually save a life.
_________________________________
Author’s email: brianjcmd@hotmail.com
