Mouth-to-Mouth May Not Benefit a Cardiac Arrest Patient

Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation is often performed along with CPR on a heart attack victim. Mouth-to-mouth can get a person breathing again, but a new study shows that performing mouth-to-mouth may not benefit a cardiac arrest patient.

Two recent studies published in the recent issue of the New England Journal of medicine found that a heart attack victim’s survival rate was just as high if a person just performed chest compressions instead of performing the more traditional combination. The new study may not make a difference for people who have already undergone a heart attack, but it might mean that more people will learn how to perform CPR.

According to The Wall Street Journal, many bystanders do not perform CPR because they fear the complexity of the movement. The current training, that includes both chest compressions and rescue breathing causes many people to avoid providing emergency aid because bystanders fear the consequences if they perform the procedure incorrectly. A similar study, conducted in Sweden, found that patients who had only the chest compressions performed on them had a slightly higher survival rate than those who underwent CPR and mouth-to-mouth.

Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation still has its uses, particularly for drowning and suffocation victims whose hearts have stopped beating.