Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) saves lives. Yet, even this cornerstone of emergency care hides a persistent and often overlooked danger: hypoventilation during manual ventilation. In the earliest and most critical minutes of cardiac arrest—before intubation, before hospital care—ventilation is typically delivered using a bag-valve mask (BVM). A technique that looks simple on the surface but is surprisingly complex in practice....

Over the past week, the Manual Ventilation Academy (MVA) has launched one of its most ambitious training sessions yet — in partnership with the Fort Worth Fire Department — and the energy on the ground is nothing short of transformational. With 10 new MVA instructors, trained by renowned lead instructor Bob Page, the team has...

Manual ventilation training is essential to maximize the survival rate of patient in cardiopulmonary arrest. Participants to these training must therefore be correctly evaluated.

While reducing manual ventilation bag size seems to offer a way of reducing the risk of hyperventilation, this move appears to have a negative impact on patient outcomes during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). In a study from Snyder et al (1),  1994 adult out-of-hospital cardiac arrests treated by the Seattle Fire Department were analysed, revealing alarming consequences of this practice: it resulted in hypoventilation, which significantly reduced the chances of achieving a Return of Spontaneous Circulation (ROSC) in this patient group.