CPR and AED Awareness
How CPR and AEDs save lives under the 2025 American Heart Association guidelines: the chain of survival, recognizing cardiac arrest and agonal breathing, calling 911, high-quality compressions, breaths and hands-only CPR, how AEDs work and how to use them, children and infants, choking, special circumstances including naloxone, and workplace AED programs under state laws, OSHA and the Cardiac Arrest Survival Act.
HSE-111 12 lessons · 4 h 56 min
Offered by HSM University · Safety Training
This is the American version of this course. See the Canadian version.
What you'll learn
- Distinguish sudden cardiac arrest from a heart attack and explain each link of the 2025 chain of survival
- Recognize cardiac arrest quickly using responsiveness and breathing, including agonal breathing and seizure-like activity
- Activate emergency services, delegate tasks, work with a 9-1-1 dispatcher and explain Good Samaritan laws and the Cardiac Arrest Survival Act
- Describe the elements of high-quality chest compressions and calculate rate, counts and chest compression fraction
- Explain when rescue breaths matter, how barrier devices are used and how the 30:2 cycle is timed
- Explain how AEDs analyze heart rhythms, which rhythms are shockable and why AEDs are safe
- Describe the steps for using an AED and adjustments for water, hair, implanted devices, patches, metal surfaces and children
- Describe how CPR differs for children and infants under the 2025 guidelines
- Respond to mild and severe choking in adults, children, infants, pregnant people and large adults, and when choking leads to cardiac arrest
- Adapt the response for drowning, opioid overdose and naloxone, pregnancy, hypothermia, trauma, electric shock and lightning
- Plan, maintain and review a workplace AED program under state laws, OSHA standards and federal guidance
- Coordinate a team response, give a handover, support survivors and responders, and identify next steps for certified training
Course content
12 lessons · 4 h 56 min total · final exam
- 1 Sudden cardiac arrest and the chain of survival 24 min · quiz
- 2 Recognizing cardiac arrest and agonal breathing 25 min · quiz
- 3 Calling for help, dispatcher-assisted CPR and getting an AED 25 min · quiz
- 4 High-quality chest compressions 24 min · quiz
- 5 Rescue breaths, barrier devices and hands-only CPR 24 min · quiz
- 6 How AEDs work 25 min · quiz
- 7 Using an AED and special situations 25 min · quiz
- 8 CPR for children and infants 24 min · quiz
- 9 Choking in adults, children and infants 24 min · quiz
- 10 Special circumstances: drowning, opioids, pregnancy, cold, trauma and electricity 25 min · quiz
- 11 Workplace AED programs and the law in the US 26 min · quiz
- 12 Putting it together: team response, aftercare and capstone 24 min · quiz
- E Final exam 20 questions
Requirements
Recommended background. You can start any course at any time.
Description
How CPR and AEDs save lives under the 2025 American Heart Association guidelines: the chain of survival, recognizing cardiac arrest and agonal breathing, calling 911, high-quality compressions, breaths and hands-only CPR, how AEDs work and how to use them, children and infants, choking, special circumstances including naloxone, and workplace AED programs under state laws, OSHA and the Cardiac Arrest Survival Act.