Face the facts: sudden cardiac arrest (suffered outside of a hospital setting) is responsible for an estimated 166,000 deaths each year - that's nearly 450 each day! More people die from sudden cardiac arrest than from breast cancer, prostate cancer, AIDS, house fires, handguns, and motor-vehicle crashes combined. Take action today - learn CPR, and you could save a life! 

Don’t just stand there - do something!

Performing CPR may look scary, so you may be afraid to try it.  But it’s important that if you see someone who needs it, you do something to help rather than nothing at all.

In fact, hands-only CPR for adults is becoming more and more popular.  With hands-only CPR, all you need to do is push hard and fast in the center of the unconscious adult’s chest.  You do not need to breathe into his or her mouth – doing compressions is the most important part.

What is hands-only CPR and when should it be used?

Hands-only CPR is CPR without the mouth-to-mouth breaths and is recommended only for adults you actually see collapse.

Hands-only CPR has two steps:

Who should know CPR?

Everyone!  About 80 percent of all sudden cardiac arrests that occur outside the hospital happen at home, but no one close by knows how to give CPR. 

Unfortunately, about 95 percent of those victims die before reaching the hospital, usually within minutes of collapsing.

What if I do nothing?

If a bystander does not provide CPR within minutes, the victim’s chances of living drop about 10 percent every minute he goes without help.  Brain death begins in four to six minutes. Source: American Heart Association

Don't Miss a Beat is brought to you by the Three Rivers CPR Task Force.