The local tradition of having free CPR classes for the greater New Hope and Lambertville, N.J., community will continue 10 a.m. Saturday, June 4.
The life-saving class, to be held at the New Hope Eagle Fire Company in New Hope, will teach all attendees how to administer CPR, how to utilize a defibrillator, how to perform the Heimlich maneuver and will hopefully, also, be a springboard to healthier living to prevent getting a heart attack in the first place.
It started around this same time in the summer of 2018, as a birthday present to John Dwyer’s husband, Herb Millman, a prominent local figure in New Hope, who died that previous December. Dwyer wanted to give something to his spouse whose heart stopped in the middle of the night. So on or around Millman’s birthday, June 5, free CPR classes came to be.
Class will be conducted by Pat Pittore from the Lambertville-New Hope Ambulance and Rescue Squad. There will be professional training dummies for CPR compressions for each person to work with. Pittore will also go over the use of a defibrillator.
To avoid the situation in the first place, Colin Kirts, founder of Koru Real Wellness in Doylestown, will talk about living a healthy lifestyle. That lifestyle consists of body, mind and spirit being in balance. Dwyer realizes that a healthier lifestyle could have given his other half more time and wants to make sure the message gets out to other families. The class will be 60 to 75 minutes.
This is not a certification, which can be done online and without the practical hands on-experience. Dwyer emphasizes that hands-on experience is key, however, to bring home and reinforce what needs to be done, if ever you are in this critical situation.
If you need certification, you can go to the Red Cross website at https://redcross.org/take-a-class/cpr/cpr-training/cpr-certification. It is $35 and individuals can get the certification at their convenience.
The suggested course of action for a certification is to take the free class for the practical on-hands training and then take the test online at one’s convenience, Dwyer noted. The knowledge is most important, he added, and doing the class without going on for certification is what most do.
This is being sponsored by The Greater New Hope Chamber of Commerce, The New Hope Eagle Fire Company, Koru Real Wellness, New Hope Pharmacy and Wellness and friends and family as volunteers. Reach outs are being made to The Greater Lambertville Chamber of Commerce and other organizations to get the word out.
After class, birthday cake (carrot cake) will be served in honor of Millman and to celebrate the lives that may be saved.
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