How do you cut death rates 17%?

The new CPR guidelines are out with all sorts of fanfare and media coverage. Great news and lots of new research and discussion over a critical tool that could save some of the 250,000 people who die of heart disease each year. But why not the same media focus on preventing the deaths in the first place?  How about this little-seen article with the staggering headline: Analyses: Heart Attack rates fall 17% after smokingbans enacted. (that was within one year and only with public smoking bans). http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-09-21-smoking-bans_N.htm

You all know my feelings about CPR – everyone should learn CPR, period. I think we need a serious re-think on our priorities though, especially when there is limited funding everywhere. Educating and preventing problems isn’t glamorous. It’s like being a parent – a long-term commitment, frequently involving nudging unwilling recipients, not always fun, but with real, positive, long-term outcomes. Plenty of research to support this very unglamorous, non-headline-grabbing methodology.  Educate boys and girl sand civil war decreases, poverty levels drop, economic prosperity increases.

What would happen if teaching water safety and swimming to children were mandatory?  Would the death rates from drowning drop 17% or more in a year?  I think so.  CPR is a crucial tool to save a life, but shouldn’t our focus be on not needing the tool in the firstplace?

Children need CPR with rescue breathing – NOT hands-only

Did you see the latest news about CPR and how effective hands-only CPR is done to the great beat of ‘Staying Alive’? Here is one of the news clips if you missed it.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-20012184-10391704.html

Yes, CPR can save a life, everyone should learn CPR, but thanks to one study that showed that bystanders are more likely to intervene if they don’t have to do mouth-to-mouth, hands-only CPR has gotten all the press. And it’s a great thing and has a great song (‘Staying Alive’) to help you get the right pace. And it can be very effective for an adult cardiac arrest victim. The problem is, for children and for all drowning victims, it is critical that traditional CPR, including mouth-to-mouth, be performed.

I checked to see what the latest research on the subject is and the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics has the following in an article published May 24, 2010:

CPR Training:  Immediate resuscitation at the site of a submersion incident, even before the arrival of emergency medical services personnel, is an important means of secondary prevention and is associated with a significantly better outcome for children with submersion injury.2,3 For this reason, all parents and caregivers should be trained in infant/child CPR. Initial resuscitative efforts for a drowning victim should include rescue breathing as well as chest compressions when signs of circulation are absent.”Hands-only” CPR is not appropriate for drowning victims. The Heimlich maneuver is not recommended to expel water from the lungs, because positive pressure ventilation by mouth or maskwill accomplish adequate oxygenation.67 Additional CPR information and courses for parents and caregivers is available through the American Heart Association and the American Red Cross. Education for health care professionals on resuscitation of pediatric patients is available through American Academy of Pediatrics programs Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) and PediatricEducation for Prehospital Professionals (PEPP).

The full text of the article can be found here:
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/126/1/e253?maxtoshow=&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=cpr+and+drowning&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&sortspec=relevance&resourcetype=HWCIT&eaf

Bottom line – if you have children, learn CPR, the traditional kind with rescue breathing and compressions. I know you wouldn’t have any problem performing mouth-to-mouth on your child if it would save their life – and that’s exactly what they would need.

Protect your child – learn CPR – with rescue breathing.

Who is watching your children?

My kids took the excellent American Red Cross Home Alone class last week. Following the course I received a phone call from a reporter at the Chicago Tribune. The reporter wanted to know why I had enrolled my kids in Home Alone and at what age I’d be leaving them alone. Given the current economic climate, parents are struggling to find care for their children over the long summer holidays. Camp, activities or babysitters that parents may ordinarily rely on can be economically infeasible in a down economy and the reporter was exploring what parents were doing with their kids. I think my children are too young to be left alone (6 and 8), but every parent has to make that decision based on their situation, their children’s personalities, and a whole list of other variables. I enrolled my children because I want them to learn, and re-learn every year, how to care for themselves so that even if they are in the care of a responsible adult they will react appropriately in an emergency or dangerous situation.

When it comes to water, having a responsible adult watch children constantly is a necessity, the experts all agree that it is critical in keeping kids from drowning, but it’s only one component of keeping kids safe. But what happens when the responsible adult loses track of the child, or isn’t paying attention? I read a blog which touched me deeply. http://ourdannyboy.blogspot.com
The mother had let her beloved 4-year old spend the weekend with his rarely-present father. The 4-year old slipped out the back door while everyone was busy and drowned in their pool. The mother was focused on doing the best for her child – emotionally, physically, mentally – by encouraging a relationship with his father. If you can’t trust a child in their parent’s care, who can you trust? As a single mother myself, her story tapped into my deepest fears – if I take my eyes of my children for even a minute – will they still be safe? We assume that parents always have their child’s best interest and safety at heart, but no one can keep track of a small child 100% of the time and we need to let others watch our children sometimes. Children are hard-wired to explore their environment, it’s our job to give them the space to explore safely. Don’t feel badly about running through water safety rules, over and over, with your spouse, your ex, your babysitter, your parents or any other adult who is caring for your child. Teach your children not to go near any water without an adult and other basic water safety rules, help them become responsible children and, eventually, responsible parents to their own child. All children are at risk for drowning, whether in the care of their parent or another responsible adult, so remember….

TEACH your child water safety and swimming from infancy.

WATCH your child whenever they are near water.

PROTECT your child – learn CPR, because accidents do happen.

How much do you love your loved ones? Could you save them?

Two very different but similar articles caught my attention in the daily news feeds. Two stories of compassion, caring and courage. Two instances where valiant efforts were made to save a life. Where the stories diverge was in the relationships between the rescuer and the victim. In the first story CPR was attempted on the victim of a car accident. The would-be rescuer clearly was distraught and trying to help their beloved companion, instinctively using CPR to get the victim’s heart beating again. In the second story three teenagers witnessed a woman drowning, a stranger. Heedless to the lack of a ‘relationship’ with the victim, they leapt selflessly into the water, pulled the victim to safety and began CPR. In the first case the CPR was clearly untrained, a desperate attempt to revive a loved one. In the second, trained CPR may have saved the stranger’s life.

The big difference? In the first story it was a cat, in the second, people. I believe that we all possess an innate desire to help those that we love. I believe that most people would help a stranger in distress if they had the tools, the knowledge. Do you have the tools? Do you know CPR? Do you love your loved ones as much as the cat loved it’s companion? If a cat can try, so can you – get certified in CPR.

http://www.sott.net/articles/show/208364-Students-leap-into-river-to-save-drowning-woman-after-British-police-REFUSE-to-rescue-her

Can your child 911 from a cell phone correctly?

As with most things related to technology, I find that my perceptions of ‘age appropriate’ can be very dated. My 8-year old knows his way around my Mac better than I do. My 6-year old regularly checks the weather/times around the world on my phone. When I was six I didn’t know what a time zone was. If you asked me about cell phones and kids a couple of years ago I’d have probably said age 12 or 13, but life changes and the reasons to carry a cell phone change. When my teenager heads back to his other family in June, his cell phone will be designated for my younger kids to carry. Why? Because I want them to have a way to contact me easily when we are not together – whether I’ve dropped my son at soccer practice, my daughter is riding bikes with her grandfather, or they are spending the day with their dad. Then the question, what skills do I teach for using the cell phone? I’m assuming they will figure out every function on the phone within hours (and then teach me, I hope), but the most important skill is not so obvious – what to do in an emergency. One of my readers made an excellent observation that much of the time when a child calls 911 from a cell phone the dispatcher may not know where the child is located. Parents and school routinely talk about when to call 911, how to dial 911, but calling from a cell phone can be a little different. Remind your child that they need to tell the dispatcher where they are calling from, and if they don’t know, to stay on the line with the dispatcher so that person can ask questions and try to pinpoint your child’s location. For a great article about teaching your kids about CPR, Tali Orad, founder of http://www.becpr.org, recommends http://kidshealth.org/PageManager.jsp?dn=KidsHealth&lic=1&ps=307&cat_id=117&article_set=27852.

Just remember, it’s a critical difference when dialing from a cell phone, and given the attachment most kids have to their cell phones, they are likely to use the cell phone to dial 911. Make sure they know that they have to tell the dispatcher how to find them and to stay on the line until the dispatcher tells them to hang up. You’ve given your child a big responsibility and an important tool to staying safe, make sure they know how to use it properly.

How easy is it to watch your children?

Who has lost track of your child for a minute? A few minutes? Come on, I know I’m not the only one who has had that shot of pure panic at Target when one kid was begging for a toy and the other decided to play hide-and-seek under the clothing racks. Or how about at the airport when you are scanning the carousel for your luggage and suddenly realized your kids aren’t right next to you? At the playground? In a museum? The zoo? The list is endless but fortunately in most of those places, you and your child will be safely reunited within seconds, or at least in a few minutes with the help of police/store intercom/helpful strangers.
Unfortunately, there are the worst cases – where your child’s life is in danger because you lost track of them for a few precious minutes. We hear terrifying stories of abductions that make us more vigilant, but do you know the most dangerous place to lose track of your child? Near water. A new study by Ruth Brenner in Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, emphasizes once again that increased supervision of children while around water is needed to prevent drowning – a leading cause of injury-related death in children. I love the water. My kids love the water. Our best time spent together often involves being in or around water – pools, ocean, lakes, Chicago’s Millenium Fountain – but I know that is also one place where I can’t afford to lose track of them for even 2 minutes. I’ll teach my kids water safety, I’ll make sure they are strong swimmers, I’m certified in CPR – but part of water safety is knowing that I need to watch them, constantly.

Could you be a Good Samaritan?

I love stories where ‘ordinary’ people are inspired to bring a positive change to their environment. Laura Van Straaten saw someone performing CPR on a stranger in her neighborhood last winter and decided she should learn CPR so that if the time came, she could be a Good Samaritan (someone who helps a stranger in need). Good for her! But then she took it to the next level and approached New York Sports Clubs and they generously agreed to offer hour-long CPR classes in their gyms, taught for free by members of the brave professionals at the New York Fire Department. Thanks to one person’s idea, New York is a safer place to be for everyone. Wouldn’t it be great if you could marshall the resources in your town or city to do the same?

For more information, check the story at: http://www.ny1.com/6-bronx-news-content/features/112905/-i-nyer-of-the-week—i–cpr-enthusiast-helps-others-learn-how-to-save-lives

Can teenage boys feel fear?

We sat around the kitchen table recently listening to my borrowed teenager recount his scars. It took an hour. My personal favorite was how he rode his bike, while wearing his rollerblades, with no brakes, down a very steep and winding road that I know is heavily trafficked by very fast drivers. And I remembered, again, how his mother, my business partner and close friend, told me of a study which showed that teenage boys go through a period where they are incapable of experiencing fear. They can not recognize the emotion of fear in others, they do not feel fear themselves.  I remember my own younger brothers and the exploits they got up to – how high a roof can I jump off safely? How many donuts can we spin in a car after an ice storm? And how much fun was skitching – holding onto a car while on a skateboard or sliding on the ice. Having been a cautious (female) child who ‘got’ the whole concept of cause and effect verbally without needing to experiment, I listened with dread, knowing that my own 8-year old son would undoubtedly be trying feats of daring and experimentation once he hit the teen years.

So, what is a parent to do? I’m guessing that fighting what seems to be a ‘survival of the fittest’ developmental phase is pretty pointless, so how about equipping our kids with life-saving skills? When they are out with their friends doing things that would turn our hair white and shorten our own lifespan by a decade if we knew the full details (and how much of your teenage years did your parents really know about so don’t think it’s not happening). You’ve been teaching them right and wrong and safety since birth, but to get them ready to survive the teenage years with only scars, enroll them in a CPR and First Aid course. Think about those Outward Bound or survival courses, Scouting, or finding a like-minded adventurous mentor that can teach them the smart way while maintaining the cool quotient. Plus, I’ll be sticking with the ‘call anytime, day or night and I’ll pick you up, no questions asked’ policy. Or maybe I’ll just send my son to my friend when he’s a teenager!

Bringing home baby…

I used to volunteer in the nursery of a large teaching hospital. I found it a wonderful respite after a day in the corporate trenches where the needs of my charges were so easily met – food, diaper, cuddle. I learned many unexpected lessons in those years which helped prepare me for bringing home my own two precious babies. First, the number of totally panicked first-time fathers, faced with their first major test of fatherhood – the car seat. Some arrived with the car seat still in the box, others with the car seat lying in the trunk or across the back seat. I saw more than a few fathers almost reduced to tears as they attempted to figure out the diagrams that would ensure their long-awaited child survived the trip home from the hospital. When I had my children, we spent about 2 hours figuring out the car seat and practicing strapping in a teddy bear – before I gave birth!

The wonderful nursing staff at the hospital taught valuable care lessons – how to bathe the baby, swaddling, nursing, and burping without breaking the baby’s back (my personal fear). One life skill was missing, unless you signed up separately – Infant CPR. Many expectant parents sign up for birthing classes, but how many of us think to sign up for the CPR class? I’d guess there are a number of reasons why so few people take infant/child CPR – the time (only a few hours, much less than the birthing classes), the cost (fairly low), and maybe the fear factor. I’m pretty matter-of-fact about treating cuts, bruises, broken bones and hurt feelings, but I’m the first to say that facing the thought that my beloved child could die is almost paralyzing. That said, learning CPR can literally be the difference between life and death. An 8-month old choking on a piece of cracker or carrot, an 8-year old who has been stung by a bee for the first time and has a reaction, a 5-year old who got whacked in the chest too hard playing ball with the older neighborhood kids, a pool party where you lose track of your child for just 2 minutes and see them at the bottom of the pool. All terrifying thoughts to any parent, but knowing CPR could literally be the difference between life and death. You teach your children about stranger danger, crossing the street, you watch what they eat and fret over them when they are sick, spending sleepless nights as you reassure yourself that their breathing is normal – do your family a favor – learn CPR as well, it could save their life.

Could you have saved Emily?

At a popular Australian pool last week, Matthew Kennedy, an 8-year old boy with autism, a severe speech impediment and learning difficulties, recognized that Emily, a 3-year old girl, was in distress. He jumped in, grabbed her arms, lifted her head above the water and pulled her out of the pool. Emily was unconscious and foaming at the mouth. Matthew’s father and the lifeguard began CPR, Emily began to breathe again and she was taken to the emergency room, still alive.

There are two heroes in this story – the first is clearly Matthew, whose brave and selfless actions saved a younger child. The second is Matthew’s father, John Kennedy. Mr. Kennedy had been a lifeguard for 25 years. One month earlier he began teaching his children what to do in an emergency, as he himself knew water safety and CPR.

Teach water safety, swimming and CPR. Emily would thank you.