Advice for helping a cardiac arrest victim

Cardiac arrest is a serious medical event in which a person’s heart stops contracting and their blood stops circulating. Here is some basic advice for how you can help a cardiac arrest victim.

In any situation where you suspect that someone may be suffering from cardiac arrest, it is critical to provide assistance immediately and call an ambulance as soon as possible.

If someone is unconscious but breathing, they should be put into the recovery position to keep their airway open and ensure there is no risk of choking.

• If the victim is lying flat on their back, bend the arm nearest to you upwards, so the forearm is at a right angle to the upper arm.
• Lay the other arm across the chest.
• Support the head and gently roll the person toward you onto their side, with the head resting on the arm that was across the chest.
• Bend the upper leg to prevent the victim from rolling too far.
• Check the victim's pulse and breathing regularly until medical help arrives.

If someone collapses due to cardiac arrest, their chances of survival more than double if a bystander performs cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) to keep the heart beating. If the heart stops during an attack, the patient may lose consciousness and can die within minutes if blood flow to the brain and other vital organs is not restored.

CPR buys time. When the ambulance arrives, paramedics may be able to restart the heart with an electric shock via a process known as defibrillation.

Conventional CPR involves two elements: chest compressions to keep blood pumping through the heart and mouth-to-mouth breathing to maintain a flow of air into the lungs. However, compression-only CPR is rapidly gaining favour – especially for those untrained in CPR.

Fewer than one in three people who have a heart attack in public is helped by a bystander. Why is this? Well, some people don't know what to do, while others may be put off by the mouth-to-mouth element.

New guidelines from the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada aim to simplify the approach to helping a cardiac arrest victim and improve the outcomes for victims. The new guidelines have changed the old ABCs (Airway, Breathing, Chest compressions) to a newer system that starts with the chest compressions. For untrained bystanders, the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada says that it may be preferable to do chest compressions only.

If you see someone suffering from cardiac arrest, take the initiative to help them immediately. Quick intervention can save lives!