Every Beat Matters: Why Heart Month is so important
Heart Month is an annual UK awareness campaign dedicated to heart and circulatory health. It highlights the importance of understanding heart disease, identifying risk factors, and taking practical steps to reduce the likelihood of heart problems later in life.
This period also serves as a reminder that sudden cardiac arrest can strike anyone, anywhere, and knowing what to do, as well as having the right tools on hand, can be the difference between life and death.
Why Heart Month matters
At Defib Warehouse, our mission is to ensure the UK becomes a country where no one dies from Sudden Cardiac Arrest, and despite advancements in defibrillator infrastructure and overall health, the figures still illustrate that there is still a long way to go:
- There are approximately 115,000 out of hospital cardiac arrests reported to the ambulance services each year.
- Less than 1 in 10 people who suffer an out of hospital cardiac arrest survive currently.
- Heart issues, including sudden cardiac arrest, can affect people of all ages and fitness levels.
- For every minute that passes where someone is in cardiac arrest without treatment, their chances of survival fall by around 10%
- If CPR is commenced immediately and an AED shock delivered within 3 to 5 minutes, the chances of survival can be as high as 74% for out of hospital cardiac arrest.
There are a range of things that can be done to help support hearts in the UK, and how you can get involved this Heart Month.
Learn CPR
One of the most impactful ways to get involved this Heart Month is to learn Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR). Quick chest compressions can keep someone alive until help arrives with a defibrillator.
CPR works by keeping oxygenated blood pumping around the body and vital organs by the compressions on the chest acting as a manual pump.
Defib Warehouse offers a range of first aid training that covers CPR as well as the use of a defibrillator. You can view our Emergency First Aid at Work course here, or our 4 hour CPR and AED course here.
Find where your nearest AED is
Knowing where your nearest defibrillator is located can be the difference between life and death when faced with a sudden cardiac arrest, when every second counts. Services such as the Circuit allow defibrillator guardians to register their AED for public use, giving details of the location to the database – which is also used by ambulance services to guide 999 callers to a defibrillator.
You can view your nearest defibrillator as well as the hours it is available on the Circuit’s Defib Finder here.
Invest in a defibrillator
Having a defibrillator on your premises can improve survival chances in a cardiac arrest significantly. As stated previosuly, survival rates drop around 10% for every minute someone is in cardiac arrest without intervention. Ideally, a shock needs to be delivered within 3 to 5 minutes of collapse for the best chances of a positive outcome – having the defibrillator onsite removes any panic and wasted time in finding a defibrillator nearby.
You can view the defibrillators we currently have on offer here.
Learn and share
Talk to your family, friends and colleagues about heart health – what a healthy heart looks like, warning signs of emergencies like cardiac arrest, and how to respond.
