Start the Heart was founded 2 years ago with a mission of saving the lives of cardiac arrest victims through hands only CPR education and training. This week we have taught our 20,000th person hands only CPR. We have had over 40 interns go through our program from a variety on college institutions. Universally, our interns have been of the highest quality and we are proud to be associated with them. Many of our interns have already gone on to do great things and the rest soon will be doing great things.
(People who have done hands only CPR and saved a persons life)
We know of 6 people who are alive today that received bystander CPR from someone trained by our program. We have saved grandparents, spouses, people in airports, co-workersand total strangers. All of the life savers say “They just started singing Stayin Alive” in their head while doing CPR. These are everyday people who acted when called upon. Overall, this foundation has been successful beyond our initial dreams.
This year Kentucky passed legislation requiring Hands-Only CPR education as a requirement for high school graduation. Our foundation was a big supporter of this progressive legislation. However, this has only increased the demand for our educational services with the local school systems. During the academic year, we concentrate our teaching efforts in area high schools. We have taught in over 40 local high schools and attempt to teach every freshman in Jefferson County and surrounding counties in Kentucky.
Our efforts need to continue because cardiac arrest remains a major killer in our community. In Louisville there are 8 times the number of cardiac arrest deaths than homicides. This year bystander CPR rate in Louisville is 15%, half of the national average. We want to change this statistic in our community.
If you want to learn more about this foundation or be apart of this foundation contact us through the website . You can donate on line also to help keep the mission alive. Our classes are free to the community only through the generous donations of our many sponsors.
Thank you to everyone that has helped to make this foundation a tremendous success.