The CPR in Schools Training kit, a hands-on, interactive kit that allows educators to prepare more students, teachers and families to learn cardiopulmonary resuscitation is now available from the American Heart Association.
The kit provides training in 30 minutes or less, using a “practice-while-watching” approach. Students learn Hands-Only CPR with an inflatable manikin and training DVD, as well as rescue breaths, relieving choking and using an automated external defibrillator.
The portable kit can be reused to train a whole class, grade level or school. Each kit comes with 10 manikins and instructional DVDs that students can take home to share with their families and communities.
“Four out of every five out-of-hospital cardiac arrests occur in private or residential settings, so we have to find ways to emphasize the importance of knowing CPR to save the lives of family members and loved ones,” said Robert W. Neumar, M.D., Ph.D., chair of the American Heart Association’s Emergency Cardiovascular Care Committee and professor and chair of the University of Michigan Medical School’s Department of Emergency Medicine.
Twelve states have passed CPR in schools legislation requiring all students to be trained in psychomotor skill-based CPR before graduating from high school. Seven of them have laws in place or that go into effect this school year; five more have passed laws that will be implemented in the future.
Nearly 360,000 people experience cardiac arrest outside of a hospital each year. Most of those victims die, often because bystanders don’t know how to start CPR or are afraid they’ll do something wrong.
For more information on the American Heart Association’s CPR & first aid programs look online or call 1-877-AHA-4CPR.