The air we breathe in travels to our lungs where oxygen is picked up by our blood and then pumped by the heart to our tissue and organs. When a person experiences cardiac arrest - whether due to heart failure in adults and the elderly or an injury such as near drowning, electrocution or severe trauma in a child - the heart goes from a normal beat to an arrhythmic pattern called ventricular fibrillation, and eventually ceases to beat altogether.
This prevents oxygen from circulating throughout the body, rapidly killing cells and tissue. In essence, Cardio (heart) Pulmonary (lung) Resuscitation (revive, revitalize) serves as an artificial heartbeat and an artificial respirator.
CPR may not save the victim even when performed properly, but if started within 4 minutes of cardiac arrest and defibrillation is provided within 10 minutes, a person has a 40% chance of survival.
The circulatory system
Invented in 1960, CPR is a simple but effective procedure that allows almost anyone to sustain life in the first critical minutes of cardiac arrest. CPR provides oxygenated blood to the brain and the heart long enough to keep vital organs alive until emergency equipment arrives.
To make learning CPR easier, a system was devised that makes remembering it as simple as A-B-C:
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