City Employees Lead the Charge to Learn CPR
TULSA, Okla. – Mayor Dewey Bartlett is encouraging City of Tulsa employees to celebrate Heart Month and take advantage of CPR classes being offered this week and next week at City Hall. “I encourage everyone to consider taking the full CPR course if it’s been a few years, or take a refresher course. A recent incident that occurred at City Hall made me take note of my own training, and I plan to be one of the first to enroll,” said Mayor Bartlett.
Mayoral staff has worked with local nonprofit, Citizen CPR, to arrange classes for City of Tulsa employees throughout the rest of the year. “We will have at least two per month and we hope to fill them up every time,” said Leaha Kopp, executive director for Citizen CPR. “We also hope other businesses will follow suit and set up classes for their employees and that the general public will take part in our free ‘Push for Life’ classes later this month.”
CPR can be the difference between life and death for victims of cardiac arrest, especially in times of bad weather where emergency responders have difficulty reaching the scene. Even with ideal response times, a victim can die within four to six minutes if his or her heart is not being supported with CPR. Kopp points out, “Every minute that passes without CPR decreases a victim’s chance of survival by about 10 percent. In most cases, we will be doing CPR on someone we care about, so I think we all would agree that we shouldn’t take our chances.”
Tulsans are encouraged to reserve their spaces early for the “Push to Life” classes because registration is limited. “Hopefully the weather will cooperate and we can see more than 100 people trained through these events,” said Greg Stremel, Education Manager for OSU Medical Center. The “Push for Life” classes will be free to the public on February 19 and February 26 at OSU Medical Center. Class time for each Saturday is 10 a.m. – noon. Registration is available at www.tulsacpr.com or by calling (918) 596-3600.
Updated 02-08-2011
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