A third of Britons are afraid to give women cardiac massage for fear of touching their breasts
A few seconds of hesitation can sometimes cost your life. In an emergency situation, women who experience cardiac arrest in public are less likely than men to be saved by cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), revealed a study carried out by the Saint-Jean Ambulance organization, among 1,000 Britons. For what ? It seems that being in contact with a stranger’s chest would make passersby nervous and reluctant.
In fact, a third of study participants responded that they were afraid of manipulating a woman’s breast, even if it was a matter of life or death, reports Forbes.
“This is a problem”
Among the reasons given to justify this discomfort, a third of the men cited the fear of being accused of “inappropriate actions”. Almost half said they had reservations about removing a woman’s bra in order to place the defibrillator correctly. A smaller proportion of women also reported being nervous for the same reason, which is something to consider.
A quarter of respondents said they would have fewer qualms about performing CPR in public on a man than on a woman.
The results of this survey confirm a fear that apprentice lifeguards often express, said James McNulty, paramedic, with Forbes. “We regularly encountered this obstacle anecdotally during our training sessions (…) But the latest research from Saint John (Saint-Jean Ambulance, in French) really made it clear that this is a problem,” he noted.
Disadvantaged women
These reluctances have concrete consequences: according to a study published last year and covering 39,000 out-of-hospital cardiac emergencies, 61% of women who had a cardiac arrest in public in the United States and Canada received cardiopulmonary resuscitation, compared to 68% of men between 2005 and 2015.
According to the charity British Heart Foundationthis type of emergency intervention could more than double the chances of surviving a cardiac arrest. The quicker the treatment, the greater the chances of survival.
This is why Saint John Ambulance wishes to remind people of the importance of training passers-by in first aid, as it explains on his website : “It is acceptable to touch part of a person’s breasts to perform CPR in the event of cardiac arrest – or even to cut her bra or his bandage to use a defibrillator because you are trying to save his life. »
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