American Heart Association CPR Guidelines
By Sarah Rowell ·
American Heart Association CPR Guidelines
The American Heart Association (AHA) has issued some revised guidelines for cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) for both lay and professional rescuers. The recommended sequence of CPR steps is changing from airway-breathing-compressions to compressions-airway-breathing. This change will apply to adults, children and infants but excludes newborns. The former approach which began with tilting a victims head back to open the airway, pinching the nose and breathing into the mouth was causing significant delays in starting chest compressions which are essential for keeping oxygen-rich blood circulating throughout the body.
In fact, for adults with out of the hospital cardiac arrest, bystanders are instructed to focus on chest compression only CPR. Recent studies find that out of hospital cardiac arrest patients have a better chance of surviving than those who receive standard CPR.
