This could help save a life

I wouldn’t know the demographics, I would imagine it’s probably 60% men. I have to say I never feel for the sternum and never have. It’s very obvious on a real person where you have to put your hands, slightly more difficult on a child.

Under wires would make no difference to how far you push down, it is about a third of the depth of the body, you have to press hard to do that so a little thing like an underwire would not even feature.
Strangely enough most of my survival to hospital cases have been women although I’m not sure why.

Would you like to say how many were women and how many survived dizzyblonde?
Incidently I tried feeling for my sternum whilst wearing an underwired bra. It was difficult to find. The spot where one should be pushing is where the wires meet. Very difficult to feel anything and I suspect almost impossible to know if you are applying enough pressure because you are feeling the wires and not the body. possibly one of the reasons women don't survive cardiac arrests, CPR doesn't work properly for them.

Oh yes, I’ve probably performed CPR on at least a 100 plus people in the last ten years so it would be unusual if none of them was wearing an underworld bra. Obviously we fairly quickly strip them but initially it’s on the chest while the equipment is readied.
I was under the impression your original post referred to bystander CPR where it is even more important to disregard what the person is wearing. Few members of the public would be happy stripping a woman to the waist and would indeed find it difficult and time consuming to do thus reducing the already slim chance of success even more.

dizzyblonde can I ask if any of the people you have performed CPR on were wearing an underwired bra?

I absolutely agree dizzyblonde You clearly know what you're about.

It really doesn’t make any difference in real life, when you actually do it on a real person, as I have done many times you just go for the centre of the chest, you don’t have to find the sternum, you can do it visually. The vital thing is to get on the chest immediately, not to waste vital seconds removing clothes.

Our Community First Responder group recently ran a training session for the public to learn CPR and how to use an AED. About 20 people attended including a family with two girls age about 3 and 6 years old. The younger girl stayed by her Mum's side and at the end when everyone was having a practise with a mannequin she asked if she could have a go. Of course I said thinking how am I going to get the mannequin to click for her ( to show there was enough pressure being applied). So I helped by placing two fingers with the little girl's hands on the mannequin and after a few attempts it clicked. Everyone clapped and cheered for her!

Except if a woman has large breasts and is wearing a push up or underwired bra you may find it difficult to locate the sternum as the bra will stop the breasts falling to the side, out of the way.

That link reiterates what I said, people, particularly men, are reluctant to do cpr on a woman in public for fear of being accused of assault. Adding an extra level, like removing a bra, makes it less likely that they will start and it will certainly delay the start. It’s extremely difficult to get underneath a body and undo the bra, they are literally a dead weight.
Initially you only need to open a coat to start compressions, any other clothing can stay in situ until the AED arrives and that does have a pair of tuffcuts to remove clothes easily.

Link www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2019/12/07/782596879/meet-the-womanikin-the-breasted-vest-working-to-close-the-cpr-gender-gap?t=1583786490828

True but the survival rates for men are much higher than for women, and women are less likely to be given CPR so anything which helps and improves survival rates is valuable.

I really don't see the point: the sternum is the reference point and that's in the same place whether its a male or female. Presence or absence of breasts is neither here nor there, starting CPR as soon as possible is the critical thing.

Oh I agree they are odd GrannyLaine but better than nothing! It would be good to see a CPR dummy with lifelike breasts but until then this has to do.
Don't know where you are putting them but this is position for hands. Just between most people's boobs.

But Trisher when performing CPR, your hands go above the sternal notch which is above the bra area anyway. Below that and you're into the abdominal area which isn't going to get that heart started. The 'womanikin' you give the link to has the oddest breasts I have ever seen.

I suppose what happens if you are wearing a bra is that the boobs stay in the centre whereas without one they fall naturally to the side leaving a space in the middle for CPR.
I've discovered there is a way of changing CPR dummies to female ones, so people actually practice with breasts there. If anyone teaches CPR or goes on a course perhaps they could ask for one womanikin.org

I think, for bystander CPR, which is what we are talking about, you have to weigh up the risk of delay in starting compressions by fiddling around with clothes, bearing in mind most people don’t have a pair of tuffcuts about their persons, and the very, very small risk of an underwire breaking. The place the underwire would be likely to break would be underneath the breasts and your hands shouldn’t be there anyway.
There is already a recognised issue of men not wanting to start CPR on women in public because they are worried about being accused of molesting them so it would not be good to add an even more invasive procedure to the process.

GrannyLaine it may depend on the age of the bra. I've certainly had an underwire break whilst I was wearing one.

Commonsense tells me that while there may be a theoretical risk, the actual likelihood of a wire breaking is so small as to be insignificant. I've always worn underwired bras and as the wires sit flat against the chest and are quite flexible, I don't see how they could possibly break. What do others think?

I would be really interested to read that research trisher as it’s not something I’ve seen yet. If you let me know what group of HCPs they were then I can find out where to access the research.

dizzyblonde that's not what we were told by women health professionals yesterday. There is a danger of the under wire breaking and piercing the flesh during manual CPR afer all if you are doing it hard enough to break a rib an underwire is slimmer and smaller. The research on this is very new. Most CPR training is done on male body models and doesn't involve bras.

I’m a paramedic and as I said, for cpr you don’t need to worry about clothing at all for the basic chest compressions. The AED tells you to remove clothing, mainly to get correct pad placement, the risks of under wired bras are very small and the most they’d result in is a small burn, probably the least of your worries if you’re in cardiac arrest.

Well, so much for my first aid training.
I was thinking of manual cpr, though. I can't remember anything much about the defibrillator part, except the trainer said it gives you clear instructions on what to do.

Defibrillator: "Using your tough cut scissors, remove any clothing..."

Everyone who did training with me: "Eh? Scissors?"

Also a lot of public defibrillators have tough cut scissors in their case

I'm a first responder and in our kits we carry tough cut scissors which will cut through bras to give a clear chest area.

We have First Responders. I’m a fundraiser for them and was interested to discover that in their kit they carry a razor. If the patient has a hairy chest, it must be shaved where the defibrillator paddles go.