The History of CPR Training

According to the American Heart Association's website, only about 8 percent of the 300,000 people who suffer cardiac arrest outside of a hospital annually survive the attack. Among those 300,000 people are about 5,800 children and teen-agers under the age of 18 years. An individual who receives cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) has his chances of being revived doubled or tripled. No age restrictions exist for CPR training. It has been proven that children as young as 9 years old can learn and remember CPR.

Early History

• According to the CPR Awareness website, the first written account of resuscitation is from about 800 B.C. In 2 Kings, Chapter 4, Verse 34, of the King James Bible, Elijah "...put his mouth upon his mouth... and the flesh of the child waxed warm." Throughout the Bible are incidences of newborns resuscitated by midwives who used mouth-to-mouth.

  The website states that fireplace bellows were commonly used in the 1500s to perform resuscitation. Bag-valve-mask resuscitators were inspired by the technique. The practice ceased in 1829 when it was discovered that too much air could be delivered.

Modern CPR

• In 1954, James Elam proved expired air could provide an adequate supply of oxygen within an individual who was not breathing. He and Peter Safar are credited with inventing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation in 1956. The U.S. military endorsed the mouth-to-mouth technique in 1957.

  In the early 1960s, Drs. Knickerbocker, Kouwenhoven and Jude demonstrated the benefit of compressing the chest to create artificial circulation. It was combined with mouth-to-mouth to become CPR.

  CPR training methods were standardized in 1966 by the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences.

Training Manikin

• According to the U.S. Mine Rescue Association's website, a young girl was pulled out of the River Seine in Paris, France, in 1900. No evidence of violence was visible, and so it was assumed she had committed suicide. Her identity was never established. It was customary in such instances to create a death mask of the victim.

  Stories about the mystery girl, known simply as the Girl from the River Seine, were published and became a legend in Europe. Reproductions of the death mask were distributed.

  Resusci Anne, the famous CPR training manikin, was brought to life years later, in 1960, states the website. Doll and toy maker Asmund S. Laerdal of Stavanger, Norway, began his work on Anne in 1958. Inspired by the young girl's death mask, Laerdal hired Emma Mathiassen, a well-known sculptor, to create a manikin face in the girl's likeness.

Training Sessions

• The first large CPR training sessions were held in 1972 by Leonard Cobb in Seattle, Washington. He assisted in training more than 100,000 people in the program's initial two years.

  The American Heart Association began training the general population in 1973. More than 10 million people are trained through the association annually.

CPR Today

• The American Heart Association made a surprising modification to CPR in March 2008. It proclaimed that mouth-to-mouth does not have to be performed on adults who "collapse, stop breathing, and are unresponsive." In cases of cardiac arrest, according to the association, the victim has enough air remaining in his lungs and blood. Known as hands-only CPR, uninterrupted chest compressions of 100 per minute keep the victim's blood flowing to the heart, brain and other organs. Compressions should continue until help or an automated external defibrillator (AED) arrives.

  Mouth-to-mouth is still required for children who collapse and for victims of near-drowning, carbon monoxide poisoning and drug overdose.

  AEDs became widely used by police officers in the 1980s. The devices are user-friendly, and formal classes can be taught in as little as four hours.

  Public access defibrillators are available, too. Training for the general population is recommended by the American Heart Association, but it's not necessary. The devices' "clear audio and visual cues tell users what to do when using an AED and coach people through CPR. A shock is delivered only if the victim needs it."

CPR to Music

• A study conducted by the American College of Emergency Physicians discovered a novel approach to performing chest compressions. The ideal compression rate of 100 per minute can be accomplished by listening to the song "Stayin' Alive" by the Bee Gees.

  "Many people hesitate to jump in because they don't feel confident about maintaining the proper rhythm," said researcher Dr. David Matlock of the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria, Peoria, Illinois, in a news release. "Our research subjects felt that listening to 'Stayin' Alive' improved their ability to perform chest compressions at the proper speed."