Parent Savers
The Importance of Infant CPR

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Please be advised, this transcription was performed from a company independent of New Mommy Media, LLC. As such, translation was required which may alter the accuracy of the transcription.

[Theme Music]

NATHAN KOHEN: Imagine your child going limping in your arms as you hold them, or walking into the room while their playing or sleeping and noticing that their lips have turned blue and they can’t make any sounds or cry.

As parents and caregivers, we need to know how to react quickly and confidently in an emergency situations and learning infant CPR is a great step in being able to handle a number of life threatening situations. I’m Nathan Kohen and today we’ll talk about infant CPR. This is Parent Savers episode 104.

[Theme Music/Intro]

JOHNER RIEHL: Welcome once again to everybody to Parent Savers, broadcasting from the birth education centre of San Diego. Parent Savers is your weekly online on-the-go-support group for parents from the newborn years through kindergarten.

I’m your host Johner Riehl. Thanks again to all of our loyal listeners who join us week in and week out and thanks also to those of you who are listening for the first time. As you may know you can join our Parent Savers club and receive access to special bonus contents after each new show plus special giveaways and discounts from time to time. And if you haven’t already, please make sure to download the free Parents Savers app. You can get it for your Android phone or your I device, your Apple device it’s on iTunes. It’s free and you automatically get the latest podcast sent to you as soon as it’s available. It’s magic. It’s awesome. It’s Parent Savers.

SUNNY GAULT: New tagline.

JOHNER RIEHL: That’s right.

SUNNY GAULT: Insert here.

JOHNER RIEHL: We should get that URL our there

STACY SPENSLEY: Deliver by unicorn?

JOHNER RIEHL: Exactly. Nice. Alright so let’s start discussing about infant CPR. There’s a bunch of us in the room so you guys know who you’re listening too, who’s laughing along or not laughing along with this kind of serious topic. So my name is Johner Riehl. I’m 40 years old and I have three boys, a 7 year old, a 5 year old and a 2 year old and they certainly know how to get themselves into situations where we need to react quickly and know what to do.

STACY SPENSLEY: I’m Stacy Spensley. I am 31 years old and I’m a certified holistic health coach. I have one son who is 13½ months old.

JOHNER RIEHL: How many days?

STACY SPENSLEY: Yes it’s like where’s the flip you know he’s almost 14 months. He’s not, he’s 13½...

JOHNER RIEHL: People are critical about it but I actually totally agree. I think months are fine especially even through life.

STACY SPENSLEY: He’s in the wonder week. It does matter.

JOHNER RIEHL: What is a wonder week?

STACY SPENSLEY: It’s a period of development where basically my life sucks because he doesn’t sleep. All he wants to do is stay awake and point at everything and go “bah”.

JOHNER RIEHL: I have not heard that term sort of a way...

COLINA CAROTHERS: Yes.

JOHNER RIEHL: I’m sorry

STACY SPENSLEY: It’s an app. You guys should review it.

JOHNER RIEHL: We should totally check it out.

COLINA CAROTHERS: It is. It’s good.

JOHNER RIEHL: We will. We would check it out on a later show. Anyway I’d support 13½ months.

COLINA CAROTHERS: You like mine then. I’m Colina Carothers. I work at a call center and I have one son who is almost 11 months. Right there on the eleventh. He’ll be 11 months.

JOHNER RIEHL: Nice.

COLINA AORTHERS: Yeah.

SUNNY GAULT: Alright everybody I’m Sunny. I’m producing today’s show. I’m also the owner of New Mommy Media which produces Parent Savers, The Boob Group, Preggie Pals and Twin Talks. I am 36 years old and I have four children. My oldest is 3½ ish…

JOHNER RIEHL: “Ish”.

SUNNY GAULT: “Ish”. And then almost 2. I have a son that’s almost 2 and then I have identical twin girls who are about 5 months old now.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yes.

SUNNY GAULT: Oh and I wanted to promote our Parent Savers, our VP program.

JOHNER RIEHL: Oh that’s right.

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah. So if you guys are listening along and you’re not right here in the studio with us but you want to participate in our conversations, a great way to do that is to be part of our Parent Savers virtual panelist program. So you can follow us on Facebook and on Twitter as well. If you’re on Twitter, follow #parentsaversvp and we’ll be posting questions and comments as we are recording today. We also post some stuff in advance before we start recording and your comment may make it on the show. So it’s a great way to participate if you’re not here in San Diego.

JOHNER RIEHL: Great. And then Nathan is in the room as well.

NATHAN KOHEN: My name is Nathan Kohen. I’m 39 years old, first aid and CPR instructor at CPR Advantage and we are trying to start a family right now actually.

JOHNER RIEHL: Not right now.

SUNNY GAULT: Not right now.

NATHAN KOHEN: Not exactly right now yeah.

JOHNER RIEHL: But Adam is also in the room.

COLINA COROTHERS: Yeah. Yes.

JOHNER RIEHL: Colina’s son you might hear from time to time. That’s not Nathan trying to start a family.

[Theme Music]

JOHNER RIEHL: Alright. Before we jump in into today’s topic of infant CPR, we’re going to do a news headline and this is where we take an article or something that we’ve read online or seen somewhere and we talk about it because we think it’s of interest to parents. And this one is something that got me all sorts of fired up. I saw it about a month ago. A friend posted it on Facebook and this is actually from Parent’s magazine from the April issue of Parent’s Magazine. It’s called “10 things you should never say to your kids” and it says these everyday phrases actually do more harm than good. And so I’m just going to go through these phrases first and then we can talk about them.

STACY SPENSLEY: Yeah.

JOHNER RIEHL: But the phrases are: “great job, practice makes perfect, you’re okay, hurry up, I’m on a diet, we can’t afford that, don’t talk to strangers, be careful, no dessert unless you finish your dinner and let me help”.

And I think this is taking some of the I know that we and a lot of our listeners and us and as parents we really tried to like read a lot and do a lot of best but I think some of these just really rubbed me the wrong way. The idea like great job that you know it’s not okay that you really shouldn’t give your kids praise.

You should do it very limited and only when it’s truly warranted is what they’re saying. But the idea that somehow giving praise is going to damage the kid, I’m not sure that I agree with that and I don’t know what are you guys reaction with some of those phrases?

STACY SPENSLEY: I’m not. I read the article when it came out and I posted it to my Facebook page…

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

STACY SPENSLEY: And eventually had some conversation with some other moms and basically I think some people took - which I agree is like as they teach us to answer never like it’s a red flag. So it’s not you should never say those phrases but I think when like I have a 13 month old so 13½ month old and you know so he’s starting to do you know like little shaped toys you can like stick the circle through and the triangle through and so we haven’t clapped and stuff and celebrate that he did it but every time we say good job you know it’s like he’s not like he cured cancer, he put a circle through a circle you know and so we do say it but we try to keep it kind of limited so like we’re encouraging him but also helping him to celebrate his accomplishment not saying you’ve done something that makes you worthy of love is what kind of the article says.

JOHNER RIEHL: And is that something you did before you read this article or that the article...

STACY SPENSLEY: I’ve read other articles that are similar that I mean Alfie Khon is a well know author who has a really great article if you Google it you can find it. That’s really when I when he was younger I read that article it was like oh that makes more sense.

SUNNY GAULT: Right.

STACY SPENSLEY: Like how he phrases it and so we try not to do it.

JOHNER RIEHL: Like you said it’s a healthy debate. I mean somebody I think like that totally makes sense right like you don’t even tell your kids we can’t afford that .

SUNNY GAULT: Or I’m on a diet. Who says that?

JOHNER RIEHL: Or I’m on a diet. Yeah.

STACY SPENSLEY: Oh yeah I’m so glad I’m not a girl. As a health coach I work with people whose parents said and they are still screwed up from it…

JOHNER RIEHL: Right.

STACY SPENSLEY: And when they are 30.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah. So I would I’m not dismissing this whole list but I think that for me the general feel some of this is taking it just a little bit too far and I feel like generally speaking in parenting the pendulum is kind of swinging is that we’re all now examining ourselves or like oh my gosh are we doing like too much and trying to relax a bit and let kids play more and be themselves and don’t say be careful and let them explore. But I think this is starting to take it a little too far for something…

SUNNY GAULT: What I’m curious you said be careful, why is that bad?

COLINA COROTHERS: It’s too general. It doesn’t, be careful of what?

JOHNER RIEHL: Right.

SUNNY GAULT: Oh so okay…

JOHNER RIEHL: Saying it while your child is like balancing on the monkey bar it actually makes it more likely to fall because they are kind of examining stuffs and of course they're being you know of course they’re being careful like that’s but they’re also kind of exploring.

SUNNY GAULT: Sometimes they’re though sometimes they’re not.

STACY SPENSLEY: I don’t really remember what that article said…

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

STACY SPENSLEY: But like my take away from it is like so if they’re not supposed to walk on the grass and just to walk on the sidewalk…

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah.

STACY SPENSELY: You can say don’t walk on the grass and all they here is walk on the grass. When you say stay on the sidewalk that’s a positive version.

SUNNY GAULT: Oh so okay.

JOHNER RIEHL: No but this is more this is actually like this is saying like if you don’t say be careful if you add a word you’re going to fall just go close to him so you can be there if they do but don’t say the word.

SUNNY GAULT: Because it’s better for them to learn through experience kind of thing like if you fall off then you know.

JOHNER RIEHL: They said actually that you’re just distracting him and they’re going to lose focus.

NATHAN KOHEN: Can you offer a corrective suggestion like slow down or you know…

JOHNER RIEHL: Right.

NATHAN KOHEN: Because maybe they’re excited they’re caught up in the moment.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: And they’re just that’s why they’re not being careful so…

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah it’s interesting.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah I mean in this sense I think be careful is like the [inaudible] were it is just a distracting phrase not necessarily the

SUNNY GAULT: Oh.

JOHNER RIEHL: Thought of be careful.

SUNNY GAULT: Interesting.

JOHNER RIEHL: But yeah I could go on with this actually for a long time but I’m not going to. We’re going to move on to the topic of infant CPR but…

SUNNY GAULT: Check out the article.

JOHNER RIEHL: It’s a really interesting article…

STACY SPENSLEY: Yeah.

JOHNER RIEHL: We’ll link to it on the site and if we haven’t posted on Facebook yet we definitely will.

[Theme Music]

JOHNER RIEHL: Today’s topic for Parents Savers is “infant CPR”. We’re talking with Nathan Kohen an instructor from CPR Advantage. Thanks for joining us Nathan.

NATHAN KOHEN: Thank you so much. I’m happy to be here and thank you Parent Savers for giving me this opportunity.

JOHNER RIEHL: What do you mean infant CPR? I mean because when I picture CPR… Hi Adam.

SUNNY GAULT: Adam is answering the question.

JOHNER RIEHL: That’s right. When I imagine CPR what pops through my head is like pushing up and down somebody’s chest.

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah it can be really useful for someone whose heart has stop but it’s also useful for a poisoning or a choking situation as well.

JOHNER RIEHL: So CPR is more than just…

NATHAN KOHEN: It’s more yeah I mean at its most fundamental level it’s simply pushing down on the chest hard and fast to create blood flow to all the vital organs.

JOHNER RIEHL: Okay.

NATHAN KOHEN: So that you can wake up or resuscitate the infant.

JOHNER RIEHL: What’s different about infant CPR than regular CPR?

NATHAN KOHEN: Well let’s start with one basic premise and that is if you don’t do anything at all there’s only one outcome right? So anything you’re going to try to do to help the situation is only going to help and also we don’t have a lot of 7 month olds and 7 year olds out there having heart attacks.

JOHNER RIHEL: Right.

NATHAN KOHEN: You know the most likely cause is again something related to poisoning and choking, something a lot less benign. So in the case of like an infant it’s maybe gone accidentally poisoned or the child is choked on something.

A lot of times when you find them, they have the same appearance of somebody whose heart hast stop and they’re not breathing. But the reason why CPR is so important is a lot of times in children there is still a heartbeat there. You may not be able to feel it but it’s still going it’s just starting to wind down slower and slower.

So that means if you find a child or an infant that’s not responding not breathing and you start CPR right away, regardless of what the reason for that need is that’s going to get all the blood rubbing back to the body back to those important organs, the brain, heart, kidney, lungs, get all that blood flow going and that’s going to give you the best chance of waking them up right on the spot. No paramedics, no fire fighters necessary.

So even for us as professionals when we find a situation where we need to do infant or child CPR, even with all the advanced equipment that we have, all the medicines we carry on the ambulance our first step is always going to be basic first aid. We start with 2 minutes of CPR, if it gets everything going and fixes the problem the child wakes up, fantastic. If it doesn’t, go call 911 then come back and continue.

But always do CPR first when you’re alone with the child or infant that needs it. The phone call can come after.

JOHNER RIEHL: And really the big indicator they needed is they’re not responsive. They are unconscious basically.

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah they’re unconscious. They’re not waking up for you and you know they’re just kind of loose, limp, no sounds, no obvious breathing…

JOHNER RIEHL: Right.

NATHAN KOHEN: Just no obvious signs of life.

JOHNER RIEHL: They’re eyes maybe open or close?

NATHAN KOHEN: Open or close but there’s no obvious, there’s no coughing, twisting movement.

SUNNY GAULT: Right.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: They’re just kind of laying there.

JOHNER RIEHL: Okay. And so in an infant CPR class then is teaching the techniques of how to do it with even for Adam here is 11 weeks and 3 days and 2 hours or…

SUNNY GAULT: 11 weeks?

JOHNER RIEHL: Or 11 months.

SUNNY GAULT: I think it wasn’t that recent.

JOHNER RIEHL: Exactly. But do there special techniques for that age kid or maybe from like a five month old right?

NATHAN KOHEN: There is. We teach different techniques for infants you know less than 1 year of age and it’s a different technique for older children and then for adults as well. It’s a, the big thing is that nowadays the mannequins that are used in CPR classes are way different than what they are using in the 80s or 90s. They’re not just foam mannequins anymore. They’re much more modern. They’re much more realistic and a lot of the newer ones, at least the ones we use in CPR Advantage, they have a feedback mechanism.

So it will tell you if you’re going deep enough. It will tell you when you’re going fast enough and the resistance that you feel on these mannequins now are so realistic, it’s just like a real you know the chest of a real baby or a real adult. So getting that hands on is going to take away a lot of that like question in your mind and all that kind of doubt because you’re going to know exactly how it feels. I mean even just on this baby’s CPR I think just knowing that resistance, that feeling when you push far enough…

JOHNER RIEHL: Right.

NATHAN KOHEN: Is like is going to give you that confidence to know how hard to push and how fast to push.

JOHNER RIEHL: And you’re pushing down on their chest because it’s certainly does feel like if I’m going to push on a baby’s chest, I’ll be worried I was going to break something in there.

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: No I mean honestly baby’s lesser in year of age I mean most of their bones are half cartilage anyway. You know there’s a lot of flexibility there.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: And when you’re pushing down, you’re pushing down on the breast bone. I mean that’s a big wide bone that’s there to protect the heart.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: So you’re just basically pushing on that to get the blood out of the heart and into circulation. And one of the biggest mistakes I see with parents is sometimes they’re afraid to push hard enough because they’re thinking oh I don’t want to hurt the kid.

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: The truth is that it’s much better to push all away down with full recoil each time than to just push shallow. The way I kind of explain it to my students is if you imagine like a heart is like a container filled with blood. You want to push all the way down let it full recoil. All the way down let it full recoil. That’s going to get all that blood out and into circulation for of just pushing a little bit that’s barely going to push any blood into circulation and not going to make much of a difference. So when in doubt, when you’re not sure what to do? Push hard push fast.

JOHNER RIEHL: It’s already really helpful to me to think about it to the context of why we’re doing the pushing and maybe I never even thought but you’re doing the work of the heart. You’re pumping…

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah.

JOHNER RIEHL: Blood through the body.

NATHAN KOHEN: You’re essentially buying time. You’re stabilizing the patient by keeping the blood going to those organs.

JOHNER RIEHL: Right.

NATHAN KOHEN: The heart is not doing it or it’s not doing it fast enough.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: So you’re taking over and that’s going to keep oxygen delivered to the brain, to the heart. It’s going to keep them alive and keep them kind of stable until they wake up or someone with more advance training can take over.

JOHNER RIEHL: So who you see taking your classes for infant CPR?

NATHAN KOHEN: I think it’s good for everyone who wants to know CPR. Some of the schools, high schools in San Diego are actually required of their students to graduate. Yeah it’s pretty nice but I would say that anybody that has anything to do with the children like you know anybody that takes care of kids.

So we’re talking about new parents, new grandparents, babysitters yeah. So babysitters you know just anyone that’s around kids have we have special programs for certification for day cares but then we also have like workshops that are just focused on what parents need to know.

So I would just recommend anyone that’s interested just find a reputable organization. Make sure it’s on line with like a national training regimen like the Red Cross or the American Heart Association but you know there’s a lot of opportunities out there and a lot of mom centred businesses, businesses that focus in almost focus on entirely on selling items for kids and for babies.

JOHNER RIEHL: Okay.

NATHAN KOHEN: A lot of those places will actually have classes setup. So just ask the manager. You’ll be surprised with what you find.

JOHNER RIEHL: We’re going to take a quick break. We’ve learned a lot about why and how to do infant CPR but I want to talk about some specific scenarios in the second segment. So we’ll be right back.

[Theme Music]

JOHNER RIEHL: Welcome back everybody to Parent Savers. Today we’re talking about “infant CPR” with Nathan Kohen from CPR Advantage so to talk about some specific scenarios where CPR might be useful or to help parents know what to do. What do you do if your baby is choking on something like you hear a lot about like maybe baby is trying to eat a grape well like after they’re one and they’re starting to eat something and are choking on it. What can parents do to help with that?

NATHAN KOHEN: Sure. Well first of all recognize the signs of choking. You know just to kind of tease the kids for a second you know babies you know infants are not very great communicators. They’re not going to hold their hands to their throat. They’re not going to wave their arms on the air.

So you going to kind of look for what the signs of choking are, now often times in an infant we’re going to see is that their eyes are going to get really big and kind of bugged out and they’re just going to track you everywhere you go in the room.

You know it might not even be your child. You can be out for lunch with a friend. She’s at the salad bar and the baby is staring at you. But if you notice that they’re kind of watching you and they’re just tracking you like the haunted mansion in Disneyland or they’re just following you around. That’s kind of a sign. That’s their way of saying hey I need something you know I need help come over here.

So even if it’s not your kid, get a little closer. Take a look. Now if you get closer and in addition to the big kind of eyes watching you, you notice that their lips get kind of pale or bluish pale, that’s a definite sign of choking and that blue lip sign that can come on as little as 20 or 30 seconds after getting something stuck in your throat, they can’t breathe and their lips will go from rosy to pale to blue.

So if you see that, you need to act. And even for the parents of children whose got a darker skin complexion you know even for them you know you might not see the blue in the lips but you’ll see the paleness and what we do on fire service at least is we’ll kind of pull down the eye lid and we normal see a lot of blood vessels in there.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: If that area is also kind of pale, that’s another tip off that they’re not getting any oxygen to the phase that they’re choking. So if you see big eyes, pale lips, definite sign you need to act.

JOHNER RIEHL: So in that case is chest compression is what we’re looking to do or something else?

NATHAN KOHEN: No that’s when you’re going to learn a special technique. You hold the baby over your fore arm. You rest your fore arm on top of your leg.

JOHNER RIEHL: Right.

NATHAN KOHEN: And you do slaps at the top of the back with the heel of your hands. So you use the bottom part of your hand…

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: Right between the shoulder blades and hit five times reasonably firm.

JOHNER RIEHL: With the heel.

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah down. You’re going to hit five times. You don’t want to be too light. You don’t want to be too heavy. You know you’re not looking for Godzilla’s strength here. You know you just kind of want to hit firmly with the visualization that each of these hits, this is going to get that object free. This is going to get that object free.

JOHNER RIEHL: Okay.

NATHAN KOHEN: And that and then after you do five on the back, you’re going to flip them over to the front side.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: And now on the chest on the same place you do CPR, you’re going to do five separate distinct thrust and they don’t have to be harder. All you’re looking for is to create that quick motion.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: That quick motion is going to create that puff of air that’s going to hit that object and knock it out.

JOHNER RIEHL: Got it.

NATHAN KOHEN: And if you actually visualize as you’re doing these like this is going to get the red Lego out.

JOHNER RIEHL: Alright. What about if a baby is unconscious after a big blow to the head like maybe they accidentally got dropped or they roll off the bed or something. I think that happens at least once to every family.

STACY SPENSLEY: Only once?

SUNNY GAULT: Oh yeah right.

JOHNER RIEHL: Right?

SUNNY GAULT: An embarrassing confession right there.

JOHNER RIEHL: That’s right. That’s a topic right there. Embarrassing and real of confession but yeah like if they fall off the bed and they landed kind of on their head and you’re like oh my gosh is he okay, like what’s going on.

NATHAN KOHEN: Sure. I mean that’s in all fairness that’s probably more of a first aid type of question.

JOHNER RIEHL: Okay.

NATHAN KOHEN: But I think that you know look for a change in behaviour. Look for a change in the way they’re acting. You know is there change in muscle tone, are they really lethargic and kind of listless. You know if there’s any of those changes, even if you’re not sure if you’ve seen those changes, when In doubt just call 911 or get him evaluated by health care professional.

JOHNER RIEHL: But if you didn’t see him fall off and you come in and he or she is unconscious then that’s what we talk about before. It’s maybe a CPR situation because you just want to keep the blood flowing right?

NATHAN KOHEN: I mean with the head injury you’re more worried about you know I mean there’s…

JOHNER RIEHL: But you may not know that it’s a head injury at that point.

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah I mean some of the simple signs of a head injury, they might vomit you know there’s just it’s a little comprise.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah but if you do know that It’s a head injury then a CPR maybe isn’t what you should be doing.

NATHAN KOHEN: Correct. Yeah. I mean the CPR is the indication for a CPR is they’re not breathing, they’re not moving.

JOHNER RIEHL: Okay.

NATHAN KOHEN: So with a head injury they might be injured but they’re not necessarily not moving and not breathing.

JOHNER RIEHL: So pulling a baby from the pool.

NATHAN KOHEN: Pulling a baby from a pool. Wow. So you’re still going to do CPR and honestly a big part of like keeping kids safe is prevention. So there’s a ton of great resources out there. There’s a program called infant swimming resource which teaches kids as young as six months how to like that if they fall on the pool, how they kind of hold their breath, float up to the you know roll over, float to the surface and then just kind of lay there floating. Thanks to the baby fat they’re just kind of floating in the pool crying until someone sees them and scoops them out.

Now with regards to what we do for CPR, there is a little bit of variety because I teach Red Cross and American Heart and I have two different points of view on it. And I think on this specific case, I think Red Cross is a little bit more exact because they recommend starting the CPR for the baby with the two breathes.

Normally all CPR starts with the compressions. The one exception is with poisoning or with drowning because that oxygen is super important. And the mechanism that actually helps that drowned baby or that drowned child is pretty interesting. What it is, is as you give those breaths, you actually pushing that air into the lungs which is physically displacing about two thirds of that water out of the body.

So you’re not going to see the Tom and Jerry you know fountain coming out of the mouth you know but you will see the water slowly sip and then once you get that initial water out, you’re just going to continue CPR. And the interesting part is that as you blow that air in and as you blow that air in, you’re going to actually be pushing that extra that remaining water into the tissues. And most people don’t think of the lungs as a place that could take water should be but the body can actually absorb a small amount of it.

So you either going to continue CPR which is going to get the rest of the water out or you going to wait for the life guard and when the life guard gets in, he has a positive pressurize mask for oxygen…

JOHNER RIEHL: Okay.

NATHAN KOHEN: Puts it right over the face and as he hits the button, it’s actually going to force that air into the lungs and push that fluid into the tissues. CPR is a combination of compressions and breaths. It’s very, very important for kids that you include the breathing too.

You don’t want to just air out of side and of just doing the compressions. I mean the way I look at hands only CPR because there’s a lot of hype out there about hands only right now, that’s if you are overwhelmed.

Let’s say you have a situation, you know CPR, you’re at the playground, there’s a car crash in the parking lot. If there is more than one victim, if there’s three people that needs CPR and you’re the only one that know how to do it, you can show a bystander, a good Samaritan that wants to help hey come over to this person, push on the chest just like this and then go over to the second person, hey push on this person’s chest just like this then you go over to the third person do compressions, breathing use of an AID that’s going to help even more but at least everybody is getting some help until the paramedics show up.

JOHNER RIEHL: What mistake do you see people make with infant CPR?

NATHAN KOHEN: I think that the biggest mistake honestly is that people don’t push down hard enough because in the back of their minds they’re thinking I don’t want to hurt my baby. I don’t want to hurt my child. I don’t want to push down too hard.

It’s better to push hard and fast all the way down because that’s really going to create that blood flow like as we talk about earlier. So when In doubt just go ahead and push on their chest and the interesting thing to is we sometimes joke with our students that if you’re doing CPR on an older child and you can’t tell if they’re awake, if they’re breathing or not, you know if you’re not sure send someone to call 911 you start doing CPR starting with those compressions because as you pushing down, if that child suddenly wakes up like what are doing you know why are you pushing on my chest? Oops sorry, sorry kid you know where’s your mom? Where’s your teacher you know.

And in worst case scenario if you push on someone’s chest when they don’t need it, they get a big bruise on their chest. And a great story like oh Johner thought I was dying so he’s pushing on my chest you know but It’s always better than the alternative.

SUNNY GAULT: Oh yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: So when in doubt, just call 911 and start CPR. You’re not going to hurt them you’re just going to give them a good story.

JOHNER RIEHL] I guess infant CPR class Stacy?

STACY SPENSLEY: No.

NATHAN KOEHN: Yeah I’ll show you at the next break.

STACY SPENSLEY: We did baby lead weaning when my son turn 6 months old and he had all the signs and he was sitting up and all this stuff and so I was really paranoid and I read a statistics on the internet so it must be true.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yes.

STACY SPENSLEY: But it said like only like 6% of parents experience a choking incident with baby lead weaning. I’m not sure what the age range was I’m sure adults still choke.

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah.

JOHNER RIEHL: Right.

STACY SPENSLEY: I mean it’s not like its full proof but I like obsessively make sure that we read the directions on what to do for choking.

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah.

STACY SPENSLEY: And stuff like that.

NATHAN KOHEN: Well it’s a big deal for babies because up until that first year of age, they don’t really have well defined taste buds. So nothing really tastes sour, bitter but all texture sensations are right there. So when they find like a, when they see like a bug hopping buy or a cricket or something to them It’s not like a dirty, icky but to them it’s kind of a squishy and chewy and you know…

SUNNY GAULT: Oh yuck.

NATHAN KOHNE: Crispy and flaky and all those interesting sensation so a lot of times they kind of explored the world by putting things in their mouth and so having the simple you know skills of knowing you know how to get that choking object back out…

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah.

NATHAN KOHEN: Is a huge plus.

SUNNY GAULT: In my little guy that’s almost two, he has this we call it the chipmunk. He’s go this thing that his doing now where he’ll eat his food and then stuff it in his cheeks and he won’t swallow it for a while and it’s freaking me out because you know I’m cutting his foods super tiny to ensure that he doesn’t choke and then he just walks through us like it has to disintegrate first and then he’ll like eat it. It’s like totally freaking me out and I’m like I really need to review that CPR stuff because you know something is going to get caught.

NATHAN KOHEN: I call it the chipmunk stage too. I have parents told me oh my toddler loves meat balls and so they’ll cut it to eight little pieces and then when they turn away look back and all of a sudden all eight pieces are gone so.

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah in the cheeks.

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah. I think it’s just good kind of learning you know just teaching them how to eat you know portion control, just give them a little bit, watch them, little bit, watch them.

SUNNY GAULT: Right. Right.

NATHAN KOHEN: It’s more you know more consuming of the parents time but that’s the best way to do it.

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah.

JOHNER RIEHL: Alright. So for people who are looking to take classes and I mean you may not be able to completely answer this but you know they maybe don’t live in San Diego like what are some ways for people can find infant CPR classes?

NATHAN KOHEN: Sure. Well if you’re from San Diego please come to one of our classes.

JOHNER RIEHL: CPR Advantage right?

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah but also the Red Cross and American Heart Association offered great programs for child day care certification but parents can also enrol into the same courses. But there’s also sometimes you’ll find again with those kind of mom centric and local parenting hotspots, you’ll find that often times they offer classes. And they’re usually specialize to just bare the basics of what a parent wants to know. So just check out those businesses you know ask the manager or the baby registry desk etc and just kind of see what they offer.

SUNNY GAULT: I know for us, ours was done through our health care provider and it was a free class you know…

JOHNER RIEHL: Nice.

SUNNY GAULT: So I mean that’s one thing that I would say to do is just check with your health care provider and see if they offer it.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah and as you’re taking all those classes leading to it.

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah.

JOHNER RIEHL: Alright.

NATHAN KOHEN: But the big thing for me too because a lot of people kind of do this online programs, I apologize but that’s really not a good way to go. You needed to get…

JOHNER RIEHL: That makes sense.

NATHAN KOHEN: Yeah.

SUNNY GAULT: You got to practice..

NATHAN KOHEN: Because you needed to get the hands on.

SUNNY GAULT: Yeah.

JOHNER RIEHL: Yeah.

SUNNY GAULT: You don’t have the dummy.

JOHNER RIEHL: That feeling.

NATHAN KOHEN: You needed to have that muscle memory because that’s what’s going to give you the confidence…

SUNNY GAULT: Right.

NATHAN KOHEN: In a real emergency to act without thinking. You know you don’t want to have that kind of hesitation. You want to be able to just jump in, do the right thing you know help the kid out.

JOHNER RIEHL: Alright. Well thanks for joining us Nathan. For more information about infant CPR, more information about any of our panellist, visit the episode page on our website. We’ll continue the conversation for members of our Parent Savers club after the show. We’ll talk about moving beyond infant CPR and so please stick around for that for members of the Parent Savers club and if you want to hear that and you’re not then please join. For more information about how to join, you can visit our website www.parentsavers.com .

[Theme Music]

DR. JENNIFER SHEER: Hello Parent Savers. I’m Dr. Jennifer Sheer, a clinical psychologist with the practice in San Diego. One of my specialties is working with women during pregnancy and throughout the transition to motherhood.

Today’s segment is about common adjustment the couples go through with a new baby. When baby is born, it is never again just you and me. The dyad expands into a triad. There’s often a sense of lost even as there’re simultaneous excitement about growing your family.

It’s helpful to remember about mothers and fathers often experience this transition differently and at different times. Make the transition conscious by talking about it. When baby is born, there is a healthy and yet temporary preoccupation on care giving baby. It is perfectly normal for new moms and dads to be focused on strengthening and defining these roles for themselves. And they are often different.

Some men are natural caretakers and want to be very involved in the process. Other men may become very focused on their role as a financial provider. Try to think about where your partner gains the steam for this new role as mother or father and try to understand that if the focus or tension on each other is not what you are used to, things are still fine. Rather than experiencing these changes as rejection or an indicator that something is wrong, it shows the enormous energy you are both putting into defining brand new parts of yourself and your doing it under minimal sleep. And speaking of minimal sleep, sexual intimacy and sleep deprivation are not a very good mix.

So try to be gentle with yourselves and trust that you will find a natural rhythm with one another after the hard work of learning your baby’s rhythm are firmly established. Thanks for tuning in to Parent Savers. It is my hope that having a greater understanding of common couple adjustments will help to normalize some of the changes that come with the newborn baby. And keep listening for more episodes on so how to thrive as a new parent.

[Theme Music]

JOHNER RIEHL: That wraps up today’s show. Thank you so much for listening to Parent Savers.

Don’t forget to check out our sister shows:
• Preggie Pals for expecting parents
• The Boob Group for moms who breastfeed and
• Twin Talks for parents of multiple kids.

Next week we will be talking about another exciting topic for new and new again parents.

This is Parent Savers empowering new parents.

[Disclaimer]
This has been a New Mommy Media production. Information and material contained in this episode are presented for educational purposes only. Statements and opinions expressed in this episode are not necessarily those of New Mommy Media and should not be considered facts. Though information in which areas are related to be accurate, it is not intended to replace or substitute for professional, Medical or advisor care and should not be used for diagnosing or treating health care problem or disease or prescribing any medications. If you have questions or concerns regarding your physical or mental health or the health of your baby, please seek assistance from a qualified health care provider.

SUNNY GAULT: New Mommy Media is expanding our line up of shows for new and expecting parents. If you have an idea for a new series or if you’re a business or organization interested in joining our network of shows through a co-branded podcast, visit www.NewMommyMedia.com .

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