Aspirin and Cough-CPR?

[satori001]

Snopes says coughing could do more harm than good.

http://www.snopes.com/toxins/coughcpr.htm

Having aspirin around is a good idea.

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Here is the text of a popular email:

Aspirin and CPR on Yourself might save your life

Don't forget the aspirin! Keep 3 adult aspirin in an easy, squeeze open container in our cars, on the sun visor. Grab them and chew and swallow.... aspirin is known to save lives in event of heart attacks; it acts similarly to the drug they give heart attack patients in the ER.

I also have a label on the container saying "Aspirin 30 grains" so any

Paramedic finding us would know what we have already taken, this is important. Do this and then start coughing to get the heart beating good and hard and the aspirin circulating.

CPR on Yourself

A prominent cardiologist says if everyone who gets this E-mail sends it to 10 people you can bet that we'll save at least one life. Read this....It could save your life!!

Let's say it's 6:15 PM and you're driving home (alone of course), after an unusually hard day on the job. You're really tired, upset and frustrated. Suddenly you start experiencing severe pain in your chest that starts to radiate out into your arm and up into your jaw. You are only about five kilometers from the hospital nearest your home. Unfortunately you don't know if you'll be able to make it that far. You have been trained in CPR, but the guy that taught the course did not tell you how to perform it on yourself.

HOW TO SURVIVE A HEART ATTACK WHEN ALONE

Since many people are alone when they suffer a heart attack, without help, the person whose heart is beating improperly and who begins to feel faint, has only about 10 seconds left before losing consciousness.

However, these victims can help themselves by coughing repeatedly and very vigorously. A deep breath should be taken before each cough, and the cough must be deep and prolonged, as when producing sputum from deep inside the chest.

A breath and a cough must be repeated about every two seconds without let-up until help arrives, or until the heart is felt to be beating normally again. Deep breaths get oxygen into the lungs and coughing movements squeeze the heart and keep the blood circulating.

The squeezing pressure on the heart also helps it regain normal rhythm. In this way, heart attack victims can get to a hospital.

[Bramble]

I have a heart rhythm condition and was taught this technique by the doc to reset my heart rate, thus avoiding a trip to the ER. I was also taught a 'bearing down' technique similar to pushing in child birth(harder than a bm :o-->) which also squeezes the heart.

I've used it many times with good results, though I have a sore throat afterward.

Funny, when I was in TWI I thought I was having unrenewed mind panic attacks--even though at the time I might not have been thinking about stressful stuff. I didn't seek help until we left.

I've since learned that any type of stimulant needs to be avoided, low blood sugar and unbalanced electrolites can set it off, and during a stressful event it is not a problem--the rhythm acts up after a stressful time(for me, anyway.)

[ChattyKathy]

My son thought I was being too motherly when I sent him similar information and a pair of medical rubber gloves for his glove box. He understood the coughing and aspirin, and the significance for taking it personally. But he asked how the rubber gloves were to help. I told him he lives in California and travels those highways. If ever around an accident and you wanted to aid you could slip them on your hands and protect yourself from disease better than nothing at all.

Am I being motherly?

[dmiller]

ChattyKathy --

"Am I being motherly?"

In a word ---NO. Gloves are great, and a necessary item should one run into a situation that might some how infect the *do-gooder*, through no fault of their own.

We go through 50 to 100 pairs of gloves weekly on one of our clients alone, and he has no disease that can be passed on, through lack of wearing gloves.

It is a safety precaution, pure and simple. Since your son drives a car, I bet he uses a seat belt. I'm guessing he has a spare tire, in case he has a flat.

In other words --- it is all about precaution. Hopefully he will never ever have to use them, but when the need arises ---------

(have him fill in the blank!!) ;)-->

[ChattyKathy]

Thank you, and I'll tell him you said so also. :D-->

[dmiller]

Quote me all you want to him!! :)-->

If I wuz you -- I'd have him carry more than one pair of them in his glove box. (They do break and rip frequently, if you don't put them on just right.)

[ChattyKathy]

Shoot I just mailed out his birthday box. I could have sent him a box of rubber gloves. And then waited for him to respond. :D--> :D-->

[Belle]

ChattyKathy, maybe this will help your son feel better:

Every year at Christmas my mom buys me a box of Wal-Mart stuff - toothbrush, shampoo, aspirin, Pepto, candles.... all kinds of little things. One year she gave me a box of "anti-diarrhea" medicine. My roommate gave me so much grief about that! He almost broke a rib laughing so hard.

About a week later he comes crawling into my bedroom, "Belle, where's that anti-diarrhea medicine your mom bought you? Can I have some?" :D--> :D--> :D--> :D-->

NEVER, but NEVER make fun of Mama!