Cardiac arrest treatment still starts with the person who starts CPR and opens the AED.

The American Heart Association’s public page on the treatment of cardiac arrest is short, and the sequence on it has not changed. Cardiac arrest needs treatment right away. Rescue treatment includes CPR and the use of an AED. Only about 10 percent of people who have an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest survive. CPR started right away can double or triple the chance of survival.

The page walks through the same steps any Heartsaver or BLS classroom practices: check for no breathing or only gasping, push hard and fast in the center of the chest at least two inches at 100 to 120 compressions a minute, use an AED as soon as it arrives and follow the prompts, and keep going until the person starts to breathe or move or until someone with more advanced training takes over. The machine talks. The person next to the collapsed patient still has to start.

Those numbers sit next to the school year and the workplace calendar. Pennsylvania’s Greg Moyer’s Law, signed in May, requires schools to offer CPR and AED instruction, to have certified people in each building, and to keep devices accessible at interscholastic practices and competitions, with full compliance due by May 2029. The same AHA materials that satisfy the approved-provider list also meet the needs of office floors, plant floors, and community groups that simply want the skill without becoming healthcare providers.

Heartsaver CPR AED courses exist for exactly that setting, and the 2025 guidelines are still the ones in the manuals. In the room the work is unglamorous: compression depth checked on a feedback manikin, pads placed on a bare chest without hesitating, and a swap between rescuers about every two minutes so the compressions stay honest. That is what turns a page of steps into something a tired, frightened person can actually do.

Wystepek Ventures, LLC teaches the current AHA Heartsaver and BLS materials. This article is education, not a protocol and not legal advice. Follow your medical director, your employer’s emergency plan, and the manuals in the room. If a workplace or program needs a date on the calendar, the number is (724) 317-4367.