You can save a life. 

And that’s not hyperbole. 

By doing CPR on someone in cardiac arrest, you’ve given them a three times higher chance of surviving. That’s the national and local trend, says Mark Warth, the medical program coordinator for Colorado Springs Fire Department. If a bystander provides CPR the patient has a higher survival to discharge rate.

“Every minute that goes by you decrease survival by 10%,” Warth said. “We can’t put fire engines or providers in every block. We’re never going to get there faster than seven minutes. The first responder is the bystander.”

Multiple city organizations, including UCHealth, CommonSpirit, AMR and CSFD, are offering a free Hands-Only CPR training Saturday at Pikes Peak State College’s Rampart Range Campus. Register by calling 719-365-2296 or going online to tinyurl.com/3c3skjjh.

According to the American Heart Association, about 350,000 cardiac arrests happen outside of a hospital environment in the U.S. every year. More than 20% happen in a public place. In Colorado Springs the number of cardiac arrests last year was 548, Warth says. And about 40% of those arrests received bystander CPR.

There are several reasons more people don’t step in and perform CPR, the biggest of which is they don’t feel comfortable or trained well enough to help. There’s also the fear of hurting someone and the fear of litigation stemming from doing something wrong and potentially getting sued. And another more unfortunate reason, Warth says, is they don’t want to be bothered.

“Instead they take out their phone and record,” he said. “You can truly improve and save a life. Every minute that goes by you decrease survival by 10%.”

To combat litigation fears, Warth tells people about the Good Samaritan Law.

“You have to do something egregious and show you meant to cause willful harm. That’s hard to do when you’re trying to do good for a person,” he said. “We teach something is better than nothing. At least call 911 and push on the chest as hard as you can. If you can do those two things they have a better chance at survival.”

And while there is a chance you can hurt someone while doing CPR, such as cracking a few ribs, Warth reminds people it’s better to cause an injury than do nothing and have someone die.

People might also have a lingering fear of providing mouth-to-mouth, but that old CPR method went away about a decade ago when it was found the best outcome in cardiac arrest cases was solely pressing on the chest.

“It’s a heart problem,” Warth said. “Giving them breath doesn’t do anything. You’ve got to get the heart started. The best thing to do is pump on the chest. There’s no more look, listen, feel. No more rescue breaths.”

CPR training is much more accessible these days. Gone is the expensive and lengthy training, as well as the need to carry a card stating you’re certified to do CPR, though some jobs still require that.

“They’ll get some kind of completion card to show they’ve taken the class, but they don’t need it,” Warth said. “It just says I’m willing to help. If you’re going to take the time out of your day to learn CPR those are the ones willing to actually perform it.”

Practicing on a dummy during CPR training is one thing, but what about doing it in real life? When it comes to fight, flight or freeze in a stressful situation, a bystander might automatically go into freeze. Warth advises people to take deep breaths to improve the level of oxygen in the brain so they can start thinking and move into action.

“Go do what you know you can do,” he said. “Trust what you’ve learned. Know you can’t make them any worse. All you can do is make them better. The first time is scary. You’re worried about doing harm to someone, but you can’t make dead worse.”

Hands-Only CPR training, 1-5 p.m. Saturday, Pikes Peak State College (Rampart Range Campus), 2070 Interquest Parkway, free, call or go online to register; 719-365-2296, tinyurl.com/3c3skjjh

Multiple city organizations, including UCHealth, CommonSpirit, AMR and CSFD, are offering a free Hands-Only CPR training Saturday at Pikes Peak State College’s Rampart Range Campus. Courtesy