Recent research has shown that chest compressions are better rescuers than mouth-to-mouth resuscitation in CPRs. It is chest compression and not mouth to mouth resuscitation which is the right strategy to help people recover from cardiac arrest. According to a study published in the medical journal The Lancet, the advice of the experts is to drop the mouth-to-mouth resuscitation in the CPR.

A study in Japan showed that people were more likely to recover without brain damage if rescuers focused on chest compressions rather than rescue breaths.

The American Heart Association had recommended an increase in the numbers of chest compressions in CPR. The ratio of chest compression to breathing is now 30:2 in opposition to the 15:1 standard that had been recommended earlier. This increases the blood flow from the heart to the rest of the body. It keeps the blood flowing, supplying oxygen to the brain and the heart. This is more important than blowing air in to the lungs using the mouth-to-mouth method.

“Rescue breathing is an oxymoron,” says Gordon Ewy of the University Of Arizona College Of Medicine. “We’ve been doing it wrong for 40 years.”

Experts now say that one need not even bother to do mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. This is true because our body already had enough oxygen to keep the body functioning for few more minutes. The important thing is to make it move and flow so as to reach all the vital organs. Immediate bystander CPR almost doubles the person’s chances of surviving from cardiac arrest.