It was a different type of training for 3 national badminton players when they showed up at the Sports Arena Sentosa, Kuala Lumpur in a Sunday session.
Par Tien Ann, Yee Sin Foong and Hafiz Sikkandar, all 17, were there along with members of the public to learn cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) held by the sports organization in collaboration with Community Policing Malaysia.
Two medical experts, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Centre head of paediatric surgery and senior consultant paediatric surgeon Dr Dayang Anita Abdul Aziz and Serdang Hospital emergency medicine specialist Dr Sherin Intan Abu Bakar, were presented to teach participants on the importance of CPR, how to differentiate a person in need of it and how to use Automated External Defibrillators (AED).
Dr Sherin said Malaysians have to learn how to do CPR and the correct procedures so that they could assist anyone who collapsed near them.
“It is crucial to create awareness among the public regarding the basic techniques of performing CPR,” she said.
The participants with 80 in total, also learned how to assist a person who was choking.
Dr Dayang taught her audience how to recognize a choking person and the correct procedures to help them.
“Choking can cause the decrements of oxygen delivered to the brain and you have four minutes before the child dies,” she said, adding that the same procedures could also be applied to assisting the elderly.
Following the intructions, the participants had the chance to practice CPR and using AED on manikins.
Sports Arena Sentosa head coach Sulaiman Saman said it was amazing to have such a workshop on how to handle emergency cases.
“I have witnessed a friend collapsing suddenly while playing badminton and I could not do anything at that moment as I did not know what to do.”
“Thus I feel there should be more programmes like this for the public,” he added.
A participant, Patrick Chew, 69, who plays badminton twice a week at the arena, had also witnessed 2 incidents of badminton players collapsing during games.
“This workshop is needed because there should be at least 1 person capable of apply CPR and operate the AED if needed,” he said.
Ira Cheang, 39, said the workshop was useful as she learned to not just apply CPR to adults but also to children and babies.
Community Policing Malaysia founder Kuan Chee Heng inspired sports centres to be equipped with AEDs, which were used in cases of cardiac arrest.
Source: thestar.com.my
