CCHS Students Being Training in Lifesaving Hands-Only CPR

Posted november 1, 2011

Colonie Central High School students are being trained this school year in Hands-Only CPR, creating the next generation of lifesavers.

High school health teachers are using the American Heart Association’s Hands-Only CPR instruction to train the students during the school day. Some 900 students will be trained in all. Hands-Only CPR performed by a bystander has been shown to be as effective as conventional CPR with mouth-to-mouth breaths in the first few minutes of an out-of-hospital sudden cardiac arrest.

The district certainly knows the benefits of early lifesavings techniques. Last spring, a South Colonie custodian helped save a man’s life thanks to quick action and training in the use of an Automated External Defibrillator (AED). This was the 54th New Yorker suffering sudden cardiac arrest to be saved since the passage of a law requiring AEDs be installed in schools. The man had collapsed while playing adult basketball in the Roessleville Elementary School gym, and within days, was back to normal.

“That happened in a Colonie school building, where bystanders knew to call 911, start CPR and get the AED," said CCHS Associate Principal Thomas Nicholson. "I would like every student who graduates from CCHS to be able to do the same thing should the need arise.”

Hands-Only CPR can be taught in 30 minutes or less so it fits easily into a school day, explained Bob Elling, a member of Colonie EMS, paramedic instructor, and member of the American Heart Association’s Capital Region Advisory Board.

 "Since 300,000 people suffer out-of-hospital sudden cardiac arrest every year, the need to know CPR is crucial,” Elling said. “High school students are certainly capable of learning the psychomotor skills of CPR that could double or triple a sudden cardiac arrest victim’s chance of survival."

The American Heart Association is urging passage of a state law that would require that all high school students know CPR before graduation.

“We commend the South Colonie Central School District for realizing the importance of CPR instruction, and for continuing the success rate already established in the town,” Elling added.

In 2010, Colonie EMS was awarded the 2010 International Association of Fire Chiefs Heartsafe Community Award for achieving the highest resuscitation rate in the United States for a community of less than 100,000 residents. At the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions in 2010, Dr. Michael Dailey, medical director of the Town of Colonie EMS, presented his findings showing the improvement in out-of-hospital cardiac arrest survival rates from 4 percent in 2005 to 22 percent in 2009, after implementing a systems-based approach that included CPR training.