By EMS1 Staff
DALLAS, Texas — New CPR guidelines issued by the American Heart Association suggest that 911 dispatchers should know how to give compression-only CPR instructions to callers.
Currently, only half of the nation’s dispatchers are giving CPR instructions over the phone, according to a study by AHA.
The guidelines released Tuesday said that if dispatchers know how to give instructions over the phone, they can help callers perform CPR until EMS crews arrive.
“Doing anything is better than nothing,” AHA’s emergency cardiovascular care committee chairman Karl Kern said.
According to the AHA, CPR can triple a cardiac arrest patient’s chance of survival if done within the first few minutes, but less than half of those who experience cardiac arrest are given CPR by a bystander.