Ventilatory Efficacy of Mouth-to-Mouth Artificial Respiration

There are misconceptions in the present thinking about emergency artificial respiration because not enough attention is paid to the behavior of the airway above the larynx. Therefore, this report will present data on airway obstruction with the mouth-to-mouth and chest-pressure arm-lift methods, a recommendation of two techniques of mouth-to-mouth artificial respiration without equipment, and data on pulmonary ventilation produced by the mouth-to-mouth method. Experimental Methods The mouth-to-mouth method and the chest pressure arm-lift methods were studied and compared during 27 controlled experiments in which an endotracheal tube was not used. One hundred and sixty-seven untrained rescuers (62 firefighters, 6 policemen, 4 soldiers, 16 Red Cross workers, 23 doctors, 8 nurses, 36 medical students, 6 housewives, and 6 Boy Scouts) performed the mouth-to-mouth methods, and 18 trained rescuers performed the chest-pressure arm-lift methods. The "victims" were 15 patients and 10 volunteers. The patients were anesthetized and curarized apneic adults. The volunteers,