Monthly Archives: January 2016

Latest AHA Guidelines for Pediatric Advanced Life Support – Video

Pediatric CPR

Pediatric Advanced Life Support is a classroom, video-based, instructor-led course to learn about a systematic approach to pediatric assessment, basic life support and effective resuscitation. Earlier in Oct’2015 AHA released the updated CPR guidelines. AHA guidelines for Pediatric Advanced Life Support aims at improving the quality of care provided to seriously ill children, resulting in effective outcomes.

Fluid Resuscitation works best for children suffering from septic shocks. Administration of Bolus IV fluids need to be undertaken with extreme caution for children with febrile illness. Atropine for Endotracheal Intubation is highly recommended in case of a patient who is at increased risk of Bradycardia.

Invasive Hemodynamic Monitoring is useful during a cardiac arrest in a child to guide CPR quality. ECPR is better than Standard Resuscitation for children with underlying cardiac conditions who have an IHCA. This need to be administered in case the right equipment for that is available.

Pediatric Advanced Life Support demands targeted temperature management. It is essential to monitor the child’s temperature continuously, so that aggressive treatment of fever is initiated.

AHA has cited special guidelines for Post-Cardiac arrest health conditions for children. A quick look at the video given below can give you an insight into various post-cardiac arrest measures to be taken to ensure well-being and safety of children facing it.

Understanding How CPR Should Be Given to the Patients

CPR Certification

It is always essential to know of some first aid techniques that can at times be very useful to save lives of others. Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is often regarded as a lifesaving technique that comes handy in many emergency situations such as:

  • Heart Attack
  • Near Drowning
  • Unable to breathe
  • Heart not beating

The American Heart Association also emphasizes on the need of undergoing CPR training, beginning with chest compression. Given below are the suggestions for giving Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation for different levels of people under the appropriate medical facilities can be approached:

•  CPR by Untrained people: Such people when falling into such situations are recommended to give hands-only CPR. This means they must compress the chest of the patient at the rate of 100 times per minute.

• CPR by Trained people: Those who know the process must give hand compressions at the rate of 30 times per minute, besides checking for the airway and giving rescue breathing.

Understanding How CPR Should Be Given to the Patients.

These methodologies are good for use on adults as well as children, but should not be tried upon newborns. Performing CPR is meant to ensure the flow of blood through the body and brain, which is essential to keep the patient in his senses

AHA updated guidelines for pediatric life support – Infographic

American Heart Association CPR

The given Infographic summarizes the updated guidelines for pediatric life support issued by AHA. Earlier in Oct’2015 AHA released the updated CPR guidelines.
New information or updates are provided about fluid resuscitation in febrile illness, atropine use before tracheal intubation, use of Amiodarone and Lidocaine in shock-refractory VF/pVT, TTM after resuscitation from cardiac arrest in infants and children, and post–cardiac arrest management of blood pressure.

Atropine for Endotracheal Intubation: There is no evidence to support the routine use of atropine as a premedication to prevent bradycardia in emergency pediatric intubations. It may be considered in situations where there is an increased risk of bradycardia. There is no evidence to support a minimum dose of atropine when used as a premedication for emergency intubation.

Invasive Hemodynamic Monitoring during CPR: If invasive hemodynamic monitoring is in place at the time of a cardiac arrest in a child, it may be reasonable to use it to guide CPR quality.

Targeted Temperature Management: For children who are comatose in the first several days after cardiac arrest (in-hospital or out-of-hospital), temperature should be monitored continuously and fever should be treated aggressively. For comatose children resuscitated from OHCA, it is reasonable for caretakers to maintain either 5 days of normothermia (36°C to 37.5°C) or 2 days of initial continuous hypothermia (32°C to 34°C) followed by 3 days of normothermia. For children remaining comatose after IHCA, there are insufficient data to recommend hypothermia over normothermia.

Post–Cardiac Arrest Fluids and Inotropes: After ROSC, fluids and inotropes/vasopressors should be used to maintain a systolic blood pressure above the fifth percentile for age. Intra-arterial pressure monitoring should be used to continuously monitor blood pressure and identify and treat hypotension.

For more guidelines go through the Infographic below:

 

Essence of Signup for CPR Training

CPR Certification

It’s not really often when someone would find himself in a situation where he would become responsible to save the life of someone else. But when this happens, it becomes important for him to know of methods like CPR or BLS, which can keep the person in senses until proper medical care arrives.

This is why the importance of undergoing CPR training can never be undermined.

Dealing with the situation

The entire situation can be highly stressful itself, which is why it also becomes necessary for the person to stay calm and remember what is expected of him. Several hospitals today offer such kind of training for individuals who want to help the society or who simply wish to undergo this training to be prepared for unforeseen circumstances.

Determining the right kind of CPR Methodology

There can be different kinds of conditions for which people may have the need for CPR. This is also why there are different training modules to handle such different circumstances with precision.

Benefits of undergoing CPR Training

Some of the most prominent benefits that a person can derive by undergoing CPR training are:

• He is well-trained to face any such situation better than others
• He is seen with high regards in the society
• He will even stand a chance to get preference when applying for a job

Essence of Signup for CPR Training

5 things you did not know about CPR

CPR Certification

Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) is a rescue procedure used when a person is not breathing or the heart has stopped beating effectively. This life-saving procedure keeps blood pumping through the heart until emergency medical assistance arrives. Learning the fundamentals of a life support skill could help you save a person’s life. Whether you’re trained in CPR or going to attend a CPR training class, you should know 5 interesting things about this basic life sustaining skill:

Keep giving breaths just until you see chest rise.
A rising chest indicates the lungs are full of air. If we continue to blow and over-inflate the lungs, the air will overflow into the stomach. Since our stomach is like a balloon, it can blow up to a point and then collapses. This collapse causes vomitting or can alos go  into the patient’s lungs, causing infection leading to death.

Use 2 fingers to perform compressions on an infant
Infants are fragile. Using the full weight of your hand can crush the infant. The pain we feel in our 2 fingers is the safety measure to prevent us from applying too much pressure on the infant.

Apply the right compression on heart
If you go too fast, you don’t give the heart enough time to refill with blood before your next compression. Essentially, you are pumping an empty heart. If you go too slow, you won’t build up the necessary blood pressure to allow for the exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide to occur.

CAB vs ABC.
CAB stands for compressions, airway, breathing. Studies show that there is still oxygenated blood in a person’s body. We can give them breaths, but that is not going to do anything. Until we start compressions and raise their blood pressure, the oxygen they have will not get to those vital organs.

People are scared of performing CPR
There are people who are scared to perform CPR during an emergency because of  the legalities attached to it. The fear of getting sued, if they make a mistake while giving CPR makes them jittery. There isn’t any lawsuit against such mistakes or errors. Lawsuits are enforced on certified CPR professionals or when they make use of AED.

5 things you did not know about CPR

 

AHA First Aid Guidelines – Video

First Aid Training

This video titled as “AHA first Aid guidelines” is created with the intention of telling users first aid guidelines in case of a health emergency.

It’s a serviceable video and therefore should be watched.
In case of a stroke first aid provider should use assessment system in order to identify the systems of strokes.  The assessment system with glucose measurement should be used.

For open chest wounds the first aid provider can leave the wound open however if dressing is required to stop the bleeding then the proper dressing can be done but make sure that it is not saturated.

If spine movement is restricted than it is not recommended to use cervical collars by the first aid providers. Use of immobilization devices can be harmful. A person should be asked to stay still.
Hemostatic Dressings can be considered for providing standard bleeding control measures. When direct pressure fails to control severe or life-threatening bleeding, first aid providers who have specific training in their indications and use may consider a hemostatic dressing.

For a person having   Anaphylaxis a dose of epinephrine is recommended. Sometimes he may not respond to the initial dose and there is still time for the advance care to reach to the patient, in that case repeat dose can be considered.

You can know more about such First Aid guidelines by watching the video below