Desiree Rossi and Lori Hewlett

Heart Health: CPR

According to the American Heart Association, studies have shown that children as young as nine-years-old can learn and retain CPR skills. This year – the 50th anniversary of CPR – the American Heart Association is calling on teens and adults in their effort to educate 1 million Americans in CPR.

Seventeen-year-old Desiree Rossi, spokesperson for the AHA joins the show to discuss her heroic story. Desiree was coming home from school when she noticed a man collapsed on the street with a crowd of people around him. No one was doing anything. Desiree, who had been trained in CPR just six months earlier at her high school, recognized the man was in cardiac arrest, and she immediately started CPR. Paramedics arrived and took the man to the hospital where he was stabilized. She will also be joined on the show by Lori Hewlett, a certified American Heart Asscoiation CPR instructor.

Desiree Rossi is a 17-year-old high school student who stepped in to help a man who collapsed outside. Since her heroic effort, Desiree has become a spokesperson for the American Heart Association's Be the Beat program to encourage teens to learn CPR and to take action when someone is in cardiac arrest.

Lori Hewlett is a middle school health educator for more than 20 years on Long Island, NY. She is a certified American Heart Association CPR Instructor, and, in addition to her students, teaches parents and other community members CPR. She is the mother of four daughters (including three teenagers).

Dr. Derrick DeSilva

5 / 25 / 2010