Organization of basic life support education for high school students – methodological recommendations for implementation into the secondary school’s teaching practice and the follow-up of the training results

Abstract

Out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA), also known as circulatory arrest, remains a leading cause of cardiovascular death. An individual who has suffered a circulatory arrest requires immediate care, and his or her circulation must be maintained artificially by cardiopulmonary resuscitation until medical personnel can restore the patient's circulation with special interventions. Ideally, care for an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest should begin immediately on the scene, by persons skilled in resuscitation and even by bystanders who witness the event. This is important because, even in the case of an immediate alert, the arrival time of an ambulance or primary care medical staff can be as long as 5-8 minutes. Irreversible damage to the brain starts after 3-5 minutes of circulatory arrest and consequent oxygen deprivation, so it is crucial that immediate resuscitation is initiated by the person who has witnessed the sudden cardiac arrest, who is often a lay person with no medical knowledge. As such, training lay people in basic life support (BLS) is of paramount importance in improving the favourable outcome of sudden cardiac arrest and reducing mortality. Our aim was to organise a BLS education project for an entire group of high school students in grades 10-12 - about 360 students - using a defined teaching methodology over a six-month period. Problems and key points identified in the management of the project are detailed in this study: the integration of education into the timetable and curriculum, the approval of the school management, informed consent of the students and their legal representatives;, the scheduling of practices, and the recording, anonymisation, analysis, and evaluation of data to support quality assurance. Our outcomes include successful, implemented, high school BLS education for 296 students, deployment of an AED, establishing community access, and creation of a potential good practice. This study, we present our strategic methods for homogenising health and education methodologies for organised CPR education of adolescents, identifying key organisational problems and their practical solutions.