How to Do the Kiss of Life

Is the individual:

• Unconscious and unresponsive?  (Not reacting to sound, touch, being shaken etc.)
• Not breathing?  (Put your cheek close to their mouth, can you feel exhaled air?)
• Without a pulse? (Slide two fingertips alongside their Adam's apple. Anything?)

You absolutely should perform CPR right now. 

You are in a potentially fatal situation, so there's no room to worry about doing something wrong.  Not acting is far more dangerous than performing the kiss of life in these circumstances.

It's possible that the lack of breathing may have been caused by blocked airways. By tilting the head upwards, while they are lying on their back, it automatically opens up those airways.

If the blockage isn't too big (or it was the tongue), then this will be enough to allow them to start breathing again.  If that is the case, then put them into the recovery position and give yourself a hearty pat on the back.

You don't need to breathe too hard into the individual's mouth. Just enough to watch the chest rise and fall. A normal breath, which lasts about a second, will be perfectly adequate.

If anybody starts mithering that you're doing it in the wrong order, just ignore them. 

I'm telling you the ABC (Airways, Breathing, Circulation) method, but there's been a massive campaign by the American Heart Association to go for CBA (Circulation, Breathing, Airways) instead. As far as I can ascertain, that's largely because people were so busy worrying about looking like they're snogging a stranger, that they talked themselves out of performing CPR.

Starting with chest compressions meant they were committed before they got to the socially impolite stage, thus were less likely to back out.

Other campaigns, like the Hands Only CPR one across two continents, took out entirely the requirement to give rescue breaths.  It was hoped that more people would prefer to save lives that way, instead of fretting what other people were thinking about them.

In short, various people learn different ways to do this. As long as you're doing one of them, it really doesn't matter which one!

More detailed instructions for chest compressions:

1. Kneel alongside the individual, adjacent to their chest.
2. Use your fingertips to pinpoint the place where the ribcage meets in the middle. This will be centrally between the two nipples, then slightly down the torso. 
3. Mark that soft spot where the ribcage forks with your middle finger.
4. Place your index finger down above it.
5. Place the heel of your other hand down alongside your index finger. THIS is the exact, optimum position to administer chest compressions.
6. Lift up your marker fingers, then place the heel of that second hand on top of the first.
7. Interlock the fingers of both hands. This will lift them away from the person's chest. You only need the two palm heels applying pressure. (If you leave your fingers down, they will be right over the ribs, not the sternum. That's how ribs get broken. Don't fret if you accidentally do that. Ribs can get fixed. Dead people can't.)
8. Lean forward, until your shoulders are directly over your hands, and your arms are straight and braced.
9. Press down hard. If you need the measurements, then the perfect pressure is to a depth of 1.5"-2" (or 4-5cm). But this really isn't the time to get a ruler out. 'Hard' works best, because the chest SHOULD depress further than you think right and proper. Just go for it.
10. Compress the chest thirty times, then give another two rescue breaths (step 3).
11. Keep the cycle going - thirty chest compressions, two rescue breaths, thirty chest compressions, two rescue breaths, and so on.

The rules are always changing.  Some trainers go for 15 compressions, then two breaths. Others say 30 compressions, then two breaths. And the Hands Only CPR campaign tells you to keep on compressing without bothering about the breaths. 

As long as you're doing something, then it's all good.  Personally, I'm still with 30 compressions and 2 breaths. Those who don't follow suit aren't wrong either.

Nellie the Elephant packed her trunk
And said goodbye to the circus;
Off she went with a trumpety-trump
Trump, trump, trump.

You learned it in kindergarten. The chorus above (just a single iteration) is precisely fifteen beats, and at the exact speed for doing great chest compressions. Repeat it - or continue into the second part of the chorus - for another fifteen beats, giving you a perfect thirty overall.

Just press down hard upon every beat, while you sing this in your head. Then give two more rescue breaths, and back for another chorus.

Trained medics can tell at a glance whether you're 'doing it right'.

If you are, then there is no good reason for them to stop you. They might as well take the extra few seconds to settle down, get their defibrillator out and apprise themselves fully of the situation. You are keeping their patient alive throughout.

The only times that paramedics will stop you immediately upon their arrival are:

• If you are exhausted (CPR is exercise);
• If you are really messing it up.

The second won't apply if you've taken the steps above.

I agree with 99% of what this US First Aider does and says, despite us learning our skills in different countries under different laws.  The 1% disagreement is solely at the end, when he states that you should stop after a certain time.

One of my old First Aid trainers told us that the record for keeping someone alive is 18 hours. CPR was performed in a remote location by a group of men, on a friend who'd been trapped under ice in a lake. It took nearly a day for two of their fellows to reach a location where emergency services could be alerted, then led back to the place where a marathon CPR session was still underway.

That man's friends refused point blank to give up on him. It was a good call. He survived and later regained consciousness in a hospital. Because his circulation was maintained, he suffered no lasting ill-effects, not even brain damage.

My rule is strictly that recounted in step five:  continue CPR until a paramedic (or doctor or nurse) tells you to stop, or else another First Aider is able to take over to afford you a break.

NB  If you really do want to use a mouth-shield but haven't got one handy, then place a handkerchief or thin fabric over the individual's mouth. As long as air passes through the material, it's doing its job.

That job, by the way, is to reduce the risk of infection from mouth sores, or bleeding gums etc. Or to stop them accidentally vomiting into your mouth. Personally I like to think I'd notice the latter coming and shift myself out of the way.