Glasgow Airport becomes BHF 'Nation of Lifesavers' partner
Glasgow Airport has shown its commitment to keeping hearts beating as it becomes the first UK airport to join the British Heart Foundation's (BHF) Nation of Lifesavers campaign.
Glasgow kick-started its support for the campaign by investing £3800 in 10 BHF Scotland Call Push Rescue CPR kits, which will be issued to various departments across the airport including its security, engineering and airfield operations.
The Call Push Rescue training kit will teach airport staff how to recognise the signs of cardiac arrest and carry out CPR on both adults and children. Each kit includes a step-by-step tutorial DVD demonstrating CPR techniques which participants then replicate using portable manikins.
Each of Glasgow Airport Limited’s 500 staff members will be able to book out one of the 10 kits and arrange group CPR learning sessions with their colleagues. Staff can also check the kits out for any external sessions they wish to organise with family, friends or groups they are part of.
The kits will then be passed on to Glasgow Airport’s airline partners, retail outlets and other suppliers to also give more than 5000 employees across the wider campus the opportunity to learn lifesaving CPR skills.
Glasgow Airport managing director Amanda McMillan said: “We are extremely pleased to be proud partners of this campaign and to work with BHF Scotland as the safety of both our staff and customers is always our first priority.
“It is inherent in each of us to try help someone who has suddenly taken ill, but often we can feel helpless due to lack of basic training. The Call Push Rescue CPR kits are an ideal remedy to this as they provide practical, simple and potentially lifesaving training.
“The kits are also reusable, so we can create a ripple effect across the entire Glasgow Airport campus to ensure these vital skills continue to be passed on as the more people we train, the more lives we can potentially save.”
The campaign aims to create thousands of potential lifesavers by providing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) training kits for free to secondary schools and communities across the country.
Kits are available for workplaces to purchase and offer their employees the opportunity to learn lifesaving skills as when someone goes into cardiac arrest, where their heart stops beating, every second counts. Calling 999 and starting CPR are the vital first steps that give someone their best chance of survival.
A cardiac arrest occurs when the heart suddenly stops pumping blood around the body. Someone who is having a cardiac arrest will suddenly lose consciousness and will stop breathing, or stop breathing normally.
James Cant, Director of BHF Scotland, said: “When someone goes into cardiac arrest every second really does count. Suffering a cardiac arrest outside of hospital is our most common medical emergency in Scotland. Just one in 20 people, who could have been resuscitated, survive. That’s a woeful figure that we’re determined to turn around.
“Fewer lives will be lost if more people have the confidence to perform CPR. Knowing that Glasgow Airport’s staff have these skills should be a huge comfort to their families, friends and workmates, as well as the nine million passengers who pass through the airport every year.”