First Aid

[Ciors]

I know we have a lot of 'medico's' out there, and I'd rally like some information on this. My workplace recently provided a first aid course, which inho was the worst one I've ever attended...the guy GAVE us the answers, to the quizz, there was no real information except for his ambulance experiences, and the only question he didn't give the answer to was the one we were most likely to get wrong and we just had to guess.

ANYWAY......he said something I'd never heard before...if someone is breathing, but struggling, 1 breath in 15 seconds, to give them 30 compressions to cause them pain so they breathe deeply.

Now, that's left me very very confused, because I thought it was actually dangerous to give compressions to someone with a heartbeat, and who was breathing. Any advice from anyone?

[Dezzy]

Mmm interesting.

I'm at work Ciors and our resuscitation coordinator is at work in ICU tonight and the intensive care consultant is also here! I showed your post to them both and they're confused. They have both said that is very odd advice! If some one is breathing you do NOT need to breathe for them and giving compressions won't really help. You can't do much harm doing the compressions but if it's not necessary why do it.

We are wondering if what he was talking about was something called agonal breathing. It has a very distinctive sound and usually precedes a full cardiac arrest in which case you would then proceed on to do the CPR.

Curious to know exactly who the instructor was!

I guess as a lay person with no access to heart monitors and oxygen, any help you can give to the patient has got to be of benefit

[Ciors]

guy's name was Kevin Manson, it was not a good session...even doing the CPR component was ordinary, he counted the beat, we did it for 1 minute and that was it, all over red rover! He didn't give it a name, just said it would cause pain and encourage the patient to breathe more deeply.