nabeepchen

In my earlier tirade about the somewhat dubious act of making defibrillators as available as Lunden’s Cough Drops (with a slightly heftier price tag), I forgot to mention the simple act of learning CPR. And how to correctly do the Hemilich maneuver.

Parents, especially, should know what to do if their child is choking. Tiny tots have an insane affinity for sticking non-edibles into their mouth. Coins, buttons, batteries, diamond earrings–all of it’s fair game, as far as a toddler’s concerned. Food can also be dangerous. Peanuts, grapes, hard candies, hot dogs–all of these can lodge in a small throat. Thousands of children end up in the ER every year, for choking accidents.

It’s not difficult to find classes for CPR and the Hemilich, unless you really are living in a remote place (like somewhere between the moon and New York City). Both the American Red Cross and the American Heart Association offer classes, and there is a subtle but friendly one-upmanship between them. Something to the effect of, “my CPR dummy is better than your dummy,” or “our technique is the best,” even though CPR techniques, and Heimlich techniques, are identical. The AHA tends to be a little more full of itself, because, afterall, they are the American Heart Association (are you impressed yet?) Truth be known, for the lay person looking to learn how to try to revive a failed heart, or how to dislodge a peach pit from their six year old’s throat, it makes absolutely no difference which “method” you use. Just check out local hospitals, community centers, adult education, community colleges, the local YMCA, etc. Someone is bound to be offering a class.

American Heart Association CPR page

Red Cross CPR Instructions

[Photo courtesy of GeekPhilosopher.com]

Beginning right now, you too, can become the proud owner of a brand new baby defribrillator. Add that to your twin SUVs, Prada shoes, and the nanny you just hired to make sure Princess Fido doesn’t get lonely during the day. The FDA has just declared that this miraculous electrical device can be purchased over the counter, same as Tylenol and Robitussin.

Over the counter defibrillator

Okay, maybe I’m being overly sarcastic. A defrillator, correctly used and most importantly, used under the right circumstances, can save lives. Despite what you see on ER, most sudden cardiac arrests, ie, heart attack victims, do not survive. An ambulance typically arrives within nine minutes of a 911 call, but 10 minutes after heart attacks hits, a person has about a 1% chance of surviving (despite what you see on ER, where 99% of people survive, even if rigor mortis has already set it).

Having a defrillator at home, in theory, can boost survival chances by quite a bit. But the problem herein, lies in being able to use it correctly. And under the right circumstances. While having it available by prescription only was no guarantee of safe and correct usage, I’m assuming that to get a prescription for it, one would have to have at least, spoken with a doctor. Or a nurse. Or a technician. Someone who might have showed them how to place the paddles, how to check for a pulse, and when to push the lever to zap that heart back into pumping blood.

Home ventilators first came into use two years ago. And according to the MSN article, which I’ve linked up to this page, about 6,000 have been sold. Without the burden of a prescription, they are looking forward to sales of about 20,000 a year.

My main concern is who, if anyone, is going to instruct people on how to use them. Or on your basics of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), where you learn rescue breathing, checking for a pulse, and the right time to either do chest compressions or defibrillate. Getting your heart defibbed is quite dangerous if it hasn’t stopped beating. Not a good thing to do if grandma has only fainted, and only appears to be in need of a zap or two.

Anyway, it would be interesting to see data, if any exists, how home defibrillators have fared over the past two years. Have they saved anyone’s life? Killed anyone? Sat around and collected dust? Any teens out there who thought that it might be a real cool thing to try out just for kicks?