Sudden Cardiac Arrest is not a heart attack. Knowing the difference could save a life.
Most people use the terms “heart attack” and “cardiac arrest” interchangeably. However, they are not the same thing, and understanding the difference matters more than most people realize. A heart attack is caused by impeded blood flow through the heart. Sudden Cardiac Arrest, or SCA, is caused by a structural or electrical problem, often from an undetected heart condition, and in other instances from an infection or a severe blow to the chest. One is a circulation problem. The other is an electrical one, and it can strike anyone, at any age, often without warning.
Sudden Cardiac Arrest is a leading cause of death in the United States, taking the lives of more than 356,000 people each year, including more than 23,000 youth under the age of 18. The survival rate is less than 10%, and that number has remained stagnant for three decades. Not because the tools to save lives don’t exist, but because the public is simply not prepared to use them.
That’s exactly what National Sudden Cardiac Arrest Awareness Month, declared by Congress in 2008, is designed to change. Because here’s what the data shows: a bystander administering hands-only CPR can triple a person’s chance of survival. Using an AED within the first minute of collapse can increase survival to 90%. The difference between those numbers and the current survival rate comes down almost entirely to whether a prepared bystander is present.
At Danella, we work in environments where medical help is not always seconds away. Job sites, remote locations, early morning crew gatherings before the workday begins. The people around you are often the first, and sometimes only, line of response in an emergency, which is why knowing CPR and how to use an AED matters here as much as anywhere. And that’s why each crew is supplied with an AED. Being prepared is not just a good idea. Out here, it is everything.
This October, take stock of what you know and what you don’t. If your CPR certification has lapsed, renew it. If you have never taken a course, there is no better time than now.
It takes less than an hour to learn something that could save a life.
- Morgan Peta, Marketing Intern
Source: https://stopcardiacarrest.org/