Paediatric basic life support: health information meeting for the citizenship
Title
Paediatric basic life support: health information meeting for the citizenship
Area of intervention
Italy
Description of the context
In Italy, about 50 children die every year due to causes connected to airway obstruction; this number is equivalent to a child per week. More than 50% of deaths from foreign body inhalation occur among children aged under five. Food is the main responsible for obstructions.
The document “Guidelines for the prevention of pediatric choking because of food” by the Ministry of Health was published in 2017. It states “The foreign body choking represents a significant health public problem (1): it is one of the main causes of death among children aged under three years old. However the accident rate remains high up to 14 years of age (2,3)”.
The Ministry document reports a steady trend of accidents, equivalent to a total of one thousand hospitalizations per year. If we consider minor events, the phenomenon takes on even greater significance, with a value of between 60 and 80 times more cases of obstruction hospitalizations.
The need to intervene in this sector is underlined by another element. It is pointed out in the Ministry report and in some data by the Susy Safe register (a control register for injuries caused by ingestion, aspiration, inhalation or insertion of foreign bodies in which data from all countries are collected). The element is that, half of the reported incidents occurred under adult supervision. This shows a lack of knowledge, by the adults responsible for supervising the child, of the problem of choking on food. In particular they lack knowledge regarding dangerous food.
Children aged between 0 and 4 years old are more exposed to food choking risk, due to their physical-psychological characteristics. Adults should be familiar with these characteristics and with intervention practices in case of airway obstruction, so as to intervene in a timely way.
Early recognition and treatment is crucial to prevent serious, even fatal consequences. In fact, the prompt execution of correct airway unblocking maneuvers leads to the resolution of the problem in more than 90% of cases.
The project
The project aims at the realization of several free public meetings addressed to the citizenship. The purpose is a widespread dissemination of knowledge of pediatric airway obstruction and cardiopulmonary resuscitation maneuvers.
Each meeting is theoretical-practical and lasts 4 hours (2 meetings of 2 hours each to reach the largest number of beneficiaries), characterized by practical exercises on dummies. A quick theoretical overview is followed by a practical part in which all participants practice on dummies (infant and child), putting into practice what they have learnt during the course.
The meeting takes place at Circolo Boncinelli in via Di Ripoli 209/E , where AnlaDi headquarter is located.
The meeting aims at preventing death from complete airway obstruction in pediatric children due to foreign body inhalation and dissemination of life-saving maneuvers. Specifically:
- Recognition of the emergency
- Knowledge of life-saving maneuvers and their correct execution
- Cardiopulmonary resuscitation on children and infants
Expected results
The direct achieved results by the project are measurable through the amount of people that joined our meetings:
-08/03/2023: 32 partecipanti
-22/03/2023: 21 participants
-05/04/2023: 20 participants
-19/04/2023: 28 participants
-10/05/2023: 14 participants
-23/05/2023: 17 participants
Until now, 132 people joined the paediatric basic life support course.
