CPR: County pushes chest compression

Washington County is taking part in a national study focused on compression-only CPR

By Jennifer Clampet

The Times, Jan 1, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009

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Without question, Susan Richardson followed the instructions relayed from the 9-1-1 dispatcher.

She was leaning over her 16-year-old son’s lifeless body. Robby, a Tualatin High School lacrosse player, had collapsed in the bathroom at home on June 29, 2007.

Hands on her son’s chest, Susan pressed down over and over, until Tualatin Valley Fire & Rescue emergency medical crews arrived.

“I remember that it was different,” said Susan. “What I was taught (for CPR) was different than what I did.”

For the last two years, Washington County 9-1-1 dispatchers have relayed compression-only cardiopulmonary resuscitation — also known as cardio-cerebral resuscitation — instructions to 9-1-1 callers who witness cardiac arrests. The compression-only CPR skips the phase with mouth-to-mouth breathing and concentrates on delivering 100 pumps a minute to the chest.

Washington County is one of 11 urban and rural communities in the United States and Canada taking part in the Resuscitations Outcomes Consortium, a study of pre-hospital emergency care focused on compression-only CPR.

Susan never actually breathed life back into her son, but she did keep his oxygenated blood circulating through his veins before crews arrived.

Sudden cardiac arrests are usually the result of an irregular heartbeat called ventricular fibrillation which causes the heart to quiver so that it cannot generate blood flow. CPR during a cardiac arrest keeps the blood moving through the body until the patient’s heart can be shocked to terminate the ventricular fibrillation.

Experts say blood has enough oxygen in it at the time of a cardiac arrest to keep a person alive for another four to six minutes. The oxygenated blood just needs to be circulated through the body.

Robby was clinically dead for 19 minutes before his heart was revived and his life saved.

A report released in early 2008 in connection with the American Heart Association showed that no difference could be found in the save rate for bystander CPR as opposed to the compression-only bystander CPR.

On average, only about 6 percent of out-of-hospital sudden cardiac arrest victims survive to hospital discharge in the United States.

In Washington County, during the first year for the compression-only instruction to 9-1-1 callers, the save rate for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest victims who had bystander CPR was 13.7 percent.

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