The life of a heart attack victim who collapses in public can often be saved by an onlooker who knows how to give CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation). In CPR, mouth-to-mouth breathing pushes oxygen into the lungs while rhythmical pressure over the heart maintains the circulation. Without this, permanent brain damage or death would result in four to six minutes.
Those who have heart attacks when alone are in much greater danger. Without help, the person whose heart stops beating properly and who begins to feel faint has only about 10 seconds left before he loses consciousness.
According to Emergency Medicine, however, heart attack victims can help themselves by repeated coughing. A very deep breath must be taken before each cough, and the cough must be strong and prolonged, as in producing sputum from deep inside the chest. A breath and a cough must be repeated every one to two seconds without letup until help arrives or until the heart is felt to be beating normally again.
Deep breaths get oxygen into the lungs, and coughing movements squeeze the heart and keep the blood circulating. In this way, heart attack victims can get to a telephone and, between breaths, call for help.
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Tags: General health