This could save your life.
Hope you will read this and remember it well in case it is ever needed! You're driving somewhere (alone of course). All of a sudden you start experiencing a severe pain in your chest that starts to radiate out into your arm and up into your jaw. You are only about five miles from the hospital nearest your home; unfortunately you don't know if you'll be able to make it that far. What can you do? You've been trained in CPR but the guy that taught the course neglected to tell you how to perform it on yourself.
HOW TO SURVIVE A HEART ATTACK WHEN ALONE
Many people are alone when they suffer a heart attack. What can they do? Without help, a person whose heart stops beating properly begins to feel faint and has about 10 seconds left before losing consciousness. However, these victims can help themselves by coughing repeatedly and very vigorously.
A deep breath should be taken before each cough, and the cough must be deep and prolonged, as when producing sputum from deep inside the chest. A breath and a cough must be repeated about every two seconds without letting up until help arrives, or until the heart is felt to be beating normally again.
Deep breaths get oxygen into the lungs and coughing movements squeeze the heart and keep the blood circulating. The squeezing pressure on the heart also helps it regain normal rhythm. In this way, heart attack victims can get to a phone and, between breaths, call for help. You'll be giving yourself CPR with this technique.
Tell as many other people as possible about this, it could save their life!
The above was taken from Health Cares, Rochester General Hospital via Chapter 240's newsletter "AND THE BEAT GOES ON..."
(reprint from The Mended Hearts, Inc. publication, Heart Response)