Posts

Come onboard as a community First Responder!

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Community First Responder has a crucial role in helping someone who suffers a cardiac arrest or even helping to put out a minor fire. Don’t forget to download the myResponder app and play your part. Click on the link below to read more.

Link:

https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/first-responders-attended-to-4500-cases-of-cardiac-arrest-scdf-to-provide-more-resources-shanmugam?fbclid=IwAR3BXep1PLke2omybu9-Pl8CmfmNLZqWbWItug-hKN2h3y71xI4e07u6UGI

 

Source: www.straitstime.com

Orchestrating better outcomes for cardiac arrest emergencies

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Find out how a young doctor set his sights on making a difference in out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) care and begin his journey to develop Singapore’s pre-emergency care model. 😍
Click here to view the article!
Source: https://www.singhealth.com.sg/news/tomorrows-medicine/orchestrating-better-outcomes-for-cardiac-arrest-emergencies

Join the Cardiac Arrest Survivors Club!

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Surviving a sudden cardiac arrest can be a challenging experience for individuals and their loved ones.
 
Join the Cardiac Arrest Survivors Club, a peer-led support group based in Singapore for survivors, their families and caregivers to help and inspire one another in rebuilding lives after cardiac arrest.
 
Sign up at: tinyurl.com/cardiacsurvivors
 
For queries, please email to ” [email protected] “

Singapore’s Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest (OHCA) Data – 2011 to 2018

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The latest data for Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest (OHCA), released by Health Ministry’s Unit for Pre-hospital Emergency Care (UPEC) shows that incidence of OHCA has jumped from 1,377 cases in 2011 to 2,972 cases in 2018. This is due to the rapidly ageing population and a rise in chronic diseases in Singapore, such as diabetes, hypertension and underlying heart conditions.

However, the bystander CPR rate has also increased significantly from 22% in 2011 to 61.8% in 2018.

The improvement in bystander CPR rates is mainly attributed to the dispatcher-assisted CPR programme introduced in 2012, where someone who calls 995 when witnessing a cardiac arrest, is guided by a medical dispatcher over the phone to perform CPR on the patient.

Singapore has done well and we are saving more lives each year than ever before. However, more can still be done to match the survival rates in the best cities in the world.

Let’s continue to DARE to save a life! #daretosaveaheart

Speaking At A Chinese Conference About Cardiac Arrest

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Telephone-Assisted CPR

One the coolest things to share with my Chinese audience is our successful dispatcher-assisted CPR story. Essentially, our cardiac arrest survival rates doubled when the emergency dispatchers stayed on the line to coach CPR while the ambulance was on its way.

AEDs Everywhere

At the same time, I was proud to recount to these Chinese professors tales of how we populated the country with AEDs. Other than having them in schools, we also have them in government flats and public spaces.

[Read on…]

Dare To Save A Life

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At the Heart of the Matter

About Cardiac Arrest

Mahna Mahna

I grew up watching The Muppet Show. One of my favourite skits is a song-and-dance with the refrain “Mahna Mahna”, that ends with an old muppet philosophising, “The question is, what is a Mahna Mahna?” His buddy cantankerously retorts, “The question is, who cares?” I couldn’t help but think about this as I reflected upon DARE. DARE is our community education campaign that teaches laypeople to resuscitate victims of cardiac arrest, launched 2 weeks ago at Toa Payoh HDB Hub. I wondered, who cares enough to be a part of this movement. [Read on…]

Discussing Emergency Medical Services In Korea

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Celebrating Emergency Medical Services in Chungju City

World Firefighter Games (http://worldfirefightersgames.com) is a little like the Olympics, with 50 countries and 6000 participants competing in sports events. Held biennially, this year’s tournament was in Chungju City. One of the highlights is the emergency medical services conference. I was grateful to be invited to represent Singapore as a speaker, albeit at the eleventh hour (Enjoying Korean Cuisine In Chungju City). [Read on…]

 

Anatomy of A Letter

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Super excited to have my letter about CPR education published in the Straits Times Forum page yesterday https://www.straitstimes.com/forum/letters-in-print/teaching-the-masses-cpr and thought I would break it down and explain what that was all about.

What is a cardiac arrest?

It’s difficult to appreciate this statement if you don’t realise what a cardiac arrest is. A cardiac arrest happens when the heart suddenly stops altogether. This could be caused by a massive heart attack which happens when the coronary vessels of the heart are blocked by too much plaque from sickness like high cholesterol. But cardiac arrest can also happen when something goes wrong with the electrical circuit in the heart, even in previously fit, healthy youths. [Read on…]

Dare to Dream

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Five years ago, my team & I had a dream, to vastly improve survival of victims of cardiac arrest by teaching bystanders how to do community CPR and how to use an AED. We wanted our programme, DARE (Dispatcher-Assisted First REsponder), to be more than an educational curriculum but a social movement with a seismic change in knowledge, attitudes and practices, in Singapore and perhaps, Asia.

Last night, I found some old photographs of my team, from 2014, 2016 and 2017 and considered how far we’ve come from an intangible wisp of an idea to a boldly fleshed out national campaign, mobile app and children’s book, all poised to be launched this Saturday, 26th May 2018. [Read on…]

Simplified CPR can also save lives

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Simplified CPR does not require mouth-to-mouth ventilations and is just as effective in helping to save cardiac arrest victims’ lives. Anyone can learn this life-saving skill, through the DARE Programme, in just 1 hour! Sign up for a free DARE training today!

[Sources:-]

  1. Zaobao
  2. Zaobao Online
  3. Wanbao