Note: Descriptions are shown in the official language in which they were submitted.
`3~3
) F T~ V I~L`IT :L ON:
This invention relates -to a teaching practise aid by
means of which a student may practice certain aspects of cardio-
pulmonary resuscitation (CPR).
BACKGROUND OF THE INVE~TION:
__._ __ _
CPR techniques are for use in reviving persons whose
breathing and heartbeat have stopped. CPR must be done
immediately, by whoever is at hand, if it is to be effective.
There is no time to wait until medical practitioners arrive.
Persons who know this and are concerned about being
prepared for emergencies therefore wish to learn how to do CPR.
This is especially so if the person has, for example, a relative
who is likely to suffer a cardio-pulmonary arrest.
The knowledge that the patient will die if the CPR is
done badly induces panic. only those actions which have been so
thoroughly drilled and practiced that they are automatic can be
relied on in the heat and stress of such a moment.
People recognize this, and accordingly, there are many
courses on CPR, wide:Ly a~ailable to the public.
In CPR, the rescuer carries out a series of
compressions of the patient's chest. These are for the purpose
of squeezing the heart, firstly to stimulate the heart's pumping
action, to keep the blood circulating; and secondly to induce the
heart to resume its own pumping action. The rescuer also carries
out mouth-to-mouth respiration, again for the dual purposes of
keeping up a supply of air to the patient, and of inducing the
patient's lungs to resume their own action.
In the CPR courses, the instructor helps the students
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~ , . . .
wi-th pract:isin~3 the nec(?ssary movelllents, either on real people or
on d~1n~lies. ~ whole industry has arisen for supplying these
dummies, the concern being in each case to make the dur~ny more
and more like a real patient.
The following patents may be reyarded as showing the
state of the art o~ such dummies:
V.S. 3,049,811 (Ruben, August 21, 1962)
U.S. 3,199,225 (Robertson, August 10, 1965)
U.S. 3,276,147 (Padellford, October 04, 1966)
10 U.S. 3,994,~75 (Kohnke, November 30, 1976)
U.S. 4,001,950 (Blumensaadt, January 11, 1977)
G.B. 791,741 (Latham, March 12, 1958)
It is recognized in the present invention that the
student has two different kinds of skill to learn if he or she is
15 to master CPR. The first kind of skill lies in becoming aware of
what it feels like to breath air into someone else's lungs, or to
massage someone else's heart, and in learning how hard to press
and to blow.
In this first kind of skill should be included the
skill that results in learning just exactly where to press a
persons s chest, and with what part of the hand, to avoid the
chance of injuring the patients ribs and organs.
The second kind of skill, for the purposes of the
invention, lies in acquiring knowledye of how many times to
repeat the chest compressions, and at what rate, and in learning
when to interpose spells of respiration, and again at what rate.
one may characterize the first kind of skill as
learning what it feels like to carry out CPR. One may
characterize the second kind of skill as the purely mental skill
d 9L ~ g ~
of r~me~ )e~ y sequences of actions, -time intervals, ~nd ra-tes.
The present inven-tion provides an aid for practising
the second kind of skill. Since Ihe aid of the invention is not
intended to simulate wha-t C~R feels like, the aid can be
extremely low-priced. The dummies previously referred to are far
too expensive for the ordinary CPR student to own. The dummies
are made for sale to the course organizers, not to the students.
A student's skill in CPR tends to fall to a practically
useless level unless the student attends periodic refresher
10 courses, say once a year. It is recognized in the present
invention, that the thing that the student tends to forget is the
second, mental memory, kind of skill. The student does not tend
to forget what CPR feels like. Therefore, a practise aid which
only allows the mental, memory, aspects to be practiced, and not
15 the physical aspects, is virtually just as useful to practice on
as a regular highly expensive dummy.
Naturally, the student does have to attend a course,
and to be started off on a dummy; but once the student has
learned what CPR feels like, the student tends not to forget that
20 aspect, or at least ~he student tends not to orget that aspect
quite so quickly as he forgets the memory aspects.
It is an aim of the present invention to provide a
teaching and practice aid which is of such a construction that is
just sufficiently like a dummy as to make the CPR action
25 meaningful when performed on it, but is otherwise as simple an~
inexpensive as possible.
It is a further aim of the present invention to provide
a practise aid that is inexpensive enough to be purchased by any
student, preferably when the student is attending a CPR course.
The aici may thell be taken llome by the s-tudent for practice at the
student's own convenience.
It is ~o be noted with respect to the apparatus of the
patents mentioned above, that keeping the dummies clean and
hygienic is a major problem for the course oryanizers. There is
no hygiene problern witil the aid of this invention, since each aid
is intended for use by only one student.
There have been practice aids proposed previously,
which have been less expensive than regular dummies. In U.S.
10 patent 3,1~,404 (CHE~HIRE, october 13, 1964) for example, a
device is shown which fits over the mouth and chest of a real
person. This device is intended to avoid the problem that mouth-
to-mouth resuscitation with a person who is breathing normally is
quite unlike that with a person who has stopped breathing.
In U.S. patent 4,0g5,590 (HARRIGAN, June 20, 1978) the
device is not intended to be like a dummy, but the device
includes (expensive~ means for indicating to the student when he
is pressing too hard. It is a vital part of CPR training for the
student to learn how hard to press, but that is a part of the
20 training that is not intended to be covered by the aid of the
present invention.
The aid itself, in this invention, includes a solid
stand, which has a base for resting on the floor. A horizontal
platform is positioned above the base on a pillar or pedestal, so
that the platform is roughly at the height of a person's chest,
when the person is lying face up on the floor.
A pad of foam material rests on the platform. Pressing
down on such a pad feels ~uite markedly unlike pressing down on
someone's chest; but that is of little importance, as has been
explained.
~ ttachecl to -the stand is a length of tubing, one end of
which is open, and which is so positioned as to simulate the
mouth of a person lyin~ face up on the floor. The tubing is so
rnade that it supports itself, once set, in the mouth-simulating
position. At the other end of the tube is a simple balloon; and
blowing into the tube is effective to inflate the balloon.
Again, blowing into the tube feels quite markedly
different from blowing into a person's mouth; but again that is
10 of little importance, as has been explained~
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF TE~E DRAWINGS:
_ _
Preferred embodiments of the invention will now be
15 described with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:
Figure 1 is a perspective and somewhat diagrammatic view
of a first embodiment of the invention; and Figure 2 is a similar
view to a slightly smaller scale of a second embodiment of the
present invention.
DESCRIPTION OF T~E PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS:
The base 2, pillar or pedestal 3, and platform 4
comprise a stand 5. A block 6 of foam material such as foam
rubber is glued onto the platform 4. The foam material is
compressible through a distance of about 4 cm and constitutes a
simulated chest.
A hole 7 is bored through the pillar 3, and a length
of plastic tube 9 is inserted through the hole 7. On one end of
the tube 9 is a balloon 20 .
The other end of the tube 9 is coupled to a push-in
elbow connector 23 which in turn is coupled to a second tube 24.
The upper end 25 of the tube 24 is open, and constitutes a
simulated mouth.
The tubes 9 and 24 are normally of the blow-moulded,
convoluted kind. The plast.ic is thick enough that, with the
dimensions of the tube as shown being in the 2 to 3 CM. diameter
range, the tube itself is, in substance, rigid and self-
supportiny.
The fact that the tubing is convoluted is an advantage.
10 The hole 7 in the pillar 3 is made simply by drilling, and it
would be expensive to try to maintain tight tolerances on the
diameter of the hole. Elowever, a convoluted tube can be easily
pushed in, yet be self-gripping in the hole on the crests of the
convolutions, even though the hole may not be accurately made. A
15 plain-walled tube, for example, could not be so easily held in
the hole.
The pillar 3 is thick enough that several convolutions
are gripped simultaneously in the hole 7, which gives a good,
firm location for the tube 9.
20In use, the student places the aid on the floor and
kneels beside it. The student can then run through the CPR
routine -- the locating of the sternum, the check for clear air
passages, the four quick respirations, the pause to listen for
breathing, the fifteen timed compressions of the chest, etc., in
25 the approved manner. Naturally, the student will have an
instruction booklet for reference during practice.
The way the balloon 20 is placed on the end of the tube
9 is an advantage. one of the routines the student performs is
to hold his fingers over the balloon end of the tube 9, to
i~
prevent tlle balLoon 2~ from inflating. When the student blows
into the mouth ~5, it Eeels quite diEferent when the balloon is
free to inflate from when the balloon cannot inflate. The
difference alerts the student to go througll the "blocked-air-
passage" motions, which miyht or might not be required in a realemergency.
The aid is intended not only for use by the student at
his or her own leisure, but is also intended for use during an
actual CPR instruction session, to supplement the use of the more
10 expensive dummies. In a course of, say, twenty students, there
would typically be only one or perhaps two dummies available.
The students can, with the invention, run through the motions on
the aid before yoing to the dum~iy, which helps them to gain more
from their period with the dummy and also means that their time
15 on the course is not being wasted in waiting for their turn.
Thus, an aspect to be considered is that of packing and
carrying the aid in quantities of about twenty at a time. The
aid described above satisfies this aspect admirably. The stand 5
is made from rectangular blocks of wood, which, apart from being
simple to make, are so dimensioned that the bases, pillars, and
platforms of the respective stands fit neatly ogether, so that
ten or twenty of the stands can fit into a box which the
instructor can pick up and carry with ease. The tubes and
balloons would be removed from the pillars for transport
25 purposes, and carried in a separate bag.
If the aid were kept by the instructor only to
supplement the use of dummies in the classroom, then a hygiene
problem would arise. Therefore, the intention would normally be
that the student takes home the aid at t'he end of the course.
~k~
~ ther dispositions of the cornponent parts of the aid
are possible, without departing from the idea of a very simple,
basic, mouth and chest simulator. Fiyure 2, shows an
alternative. The diffences in construction are clear from the
figure. Yet another configuration would have the tube 24 further
removed froln a hollow pedestal within which the balloon is
located, and which may be supported by an arm because of its
increased length. The longer distance between the foam material 6
and the moutll 25 is more replicative of the physiology of an
10 adult human.
The present invention lies not so much in the
particular manner of constructing the CPR teaching aid. Rather,
this invention lies in recognizing that some aspects of CPR are
much easier to forget than others, and in recognizing that a very
15 si~nple, inexpensive CPR teaching and practice aid is all that is
necessary for practising those aspects that are easily forgotten.
