CPR found to be somewhat effective with compression's only

[BigC]

Having been a Paramedic/Fire Capt from 1997 until Aug 2006, I am not really surprised by this. The main concern is to keep the blood circulating throughout the body. It has been shown that continuing compressions with no breaths keeps the heart hopefully in the rhythm needed to be shocked. TO breath you have to stop compression, thus stopping the heart. HOWEVER, that being said, last January I was at my old work doing the evening shift. We have a 53yr old Vault manager with a history of cardiac problems as well as open heart surgery. She does not look after herself well, eats poorly, overworks herself, the stress level is ridiculous. So here I am in her area for some reason. I usually am never there at that time of night. I hear a scream from one of the vault clerks and I run into the vault in time to see the manger slumping to the floor. I assessed her and found she was not breathing. I immediately started CPR BUT I chose to do rescue breaths a: because I saw her go down, and b: It is something I feel in my professional opinion that it is a good thing to do. I performed CPR for 12 minutes before EMS got there. (I worked in a VERY high armed security job so it is not like the medics can just waltz right in) I brought her back twice, breathing on her own, then she would stop....so the third time....I just kept at it, even as she was coming around again. The medics got there hooked her up to the monitor. I was shocked. I had been able to keep her in V-fib ( a shock able rhythm) They gave her the first round of meds and shocked her. She went into a flatline (asystole)...which is expected after the first time. The second round....same thing. I figured she has had it because of her history. The third round drugs....then shock....I'll be damed if she didn't revert back into a rhythm with a pulse and breathing with rescue assistance. Anyway, we were all worried about brain function, as this reverts back to the discussion of weather to breath or not, after dropping her core Temp and putting her into a medically induced coma to keep her as still as possible to help her heal she rested. This was wed night. They were going to start warming her back up on Sat or Sun night. Friday night I got a call at work saying that she had woken up on her own and started fighting the hoses and such. Well, after a hospital stay and more resting she returned to work the 2nd week of March. She has no significant memory loss, a few short term but nothing major. It was really good to see her again. Funny thing is, out of my 9 yrs of doing this, and all of the equipment I had along with my meds, and this time I never had anything but CPR and rescue breathing, and she is the only person I have ever been able to save....go figure.

Moral of this story, the medical field can state and change whatever they like,  I will always do breathing for a CPR victim, hopefully though, I never have to again.