A co-worker once went into cardiac arrest and, thankfully, survived due to another co-worker performing CPR. I held the affected co-worker's head while the CPR was being performed.

I write more about the whole process here: https://x.com/alexpotato/status/2094412327785316661

Some key takeaways:

- I had taken CPR many times before

- I watched the entire even unfold from watching co-worker walk in to seizure like symptoms to not breathing to urinating on themselves

- I essentially "froze"

- This was despite having years of working in high stress environments (sports tournaments/SRE on a trading floor)

- I was literally overcome by events and could not process what was happening (despite the prior training and dealing with outages etc etc)

I HIGHLY recommend that everyone, at a minimum, watch a video on how to perform CPR. Even better, take a class.

And even if you take a class, practice on a couch cushion every once in a while.

It's just like with 911:

there are stories of people in an emergency dialing 411 b/c they were overwhelmed.

In other words, fire drills exist for a reason and the same concept can be used for CPR.

If you want to learn CPR, the Disque Foundation allows you to take the class for free and attests to be aligned with the current ILCOR protocol (you might catch minor discrepancies). Before you pay them though, know that for certification some institutions will require an AHA or ARC issued certificate.

CPR: https://disquefoundation.org/cpr-first-aid-aed-certification...

BLS: https://disquefoundation.org/bls-certification-renewal/

Better yet take a first aid and CPR course every 2 years from now until they tell you that you are physically unable to do it anymore. It isn't fun, but it also only takes a few hours and if you ever need it you will want plenty of by standers around who jump in to help until emergency services arrive.

I once killed a kitten and then brought it back from the dead with CPR.

It was a stray that showed up, was covered in fleas. I decided to bathe it and it didnt occur to me that cold/room temp water would not be good for it. It was fighting but I just assumed it didnt like the water. Then it just went limp.

Quickly googled CPR cat, saw something in the (pre-AI) preview thing about blow into its nostrils (the chest was quite surprisingly inflating like a balloon without much force), and just started doing that while poking/pinching its heart area. Some amount of time later - could have been 5 seconds or 45 - it sputtered back to life.

I found it a foster shortly after. I have significant allergies to cat hair, scratches etc...

This information is outdated, wrong, and DANGEROUS.

Lifting the legs (aka shock position) has no effect and has been taken out of most first-aid guidelines for a reason.

The post also mentions "60 times a minute" when doing CPR. This is WAY to slow. Ideally you should push down 100-120 times a minute. If you do it 60 times a minutes you will not be able to generate enough blood pressure and the blood will not circulate - which is the goal of CPR.

The most important things you can do for someone during a cardiac arrest is: - Call 911 / call for help - Do CPR - If there is an AED nearby - get someone to fetch it, turn it on and follow instructions

For the love of god, do not just stand there with the legs in the air.

I learned how to CPR by watching The Office... staying alive

Learned this a long time ago in the boyscout manual

Are there any studies about the efficacy of this technique. Or even, you know, a reputable source for it?

Yes, I can help.

Why am I holding their legs in the air?

Well I read it on hacker news once.

Hacker news, oh it collates techy/stem blog posts and articles.

I don't know if the author of this post had any medical credentials.

I can see why it doesn't look like they knew what they were writing about.