North Texas

UTA Nursing Professor Shares Life-Saving CPR Message

Motivated by personal loss, UT-Arlington Nursing Professor Beth Mancini is on a mission to share a life-saving message

Each year, heart disease claims the lives of more than 17 million people worldwide, making it the leading cause of death on the planet.

As a teenager, UT-Arlington nursing professor Dr. Beth Mancini watched her father succumb to this silent killer. Now she's on a mission to share a life-saving message so no one has to experience what she did.

"My dad was never sick in his life," said Mancini.

When she was 16-years-old, she discovered her father unresponsive in his room. He had gone into cardiac arrest.

"I didn't know what to do," said Mancini. "So I called the 911 operator and had to wait for somebody to come and provide care. Unfortunately, that care didn't come in time and my father passed away."

It was a moment that shaped the course of her life.

She became a registered nurse and is now a nursing professor at UT-Arlington. She has been a volunteer with the American Heart Association for 40 years, and when she's not teaching she travels the world sharing research and best practices for saving the lives of cardiac arrest patients.

"My goal in my personal and professional life is that nobody feels what I felt standing there not knowing what to do," said Mancini.

She recently helped the American Heart Association write its new CPR guidelines, which now include a critical message for bystanders like her 16-year-old self.

"Even with no training at all, call 911, put your hands in the middle of the chest, start compressions hard and fast," said Mancini.

Statistics show that a cardiac arrest patient's chances of survival decrease 11 percent for each minute their heart is stopped. Mancini said that's why immediate action before paramedics arrive is so critical.

"Some CPR, even if it's not perfect CPR, will help people survive," said Mancini. "It more than doubles that chance of survival."

It's information she wishes she'd had back then and feels a responsibility to share now.

"I hope that everybody, every citizen, knows what it means to do CPR and would be willing to do it if the event occurred," said Mancini.

Mancini said if you find yourself in that situation and you don't have CPR training, keep doing compressions to the beat of the song "Stayin' Alive" until paramedics arrive.

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