The Weekly Show: 2/14/25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, and welcome to the weekly show here on iHeartRadio,
A ninety three nine Light FM, one of three five
Kiss FM and Rock ninety five to five. I'm Paulina,
and every week we're here to discuss a variety of
topics that matter to Chicagoland health, educations, and finances and
so much more. In between today and the show, we
have an interview with doctor Lawrence Phillips, director of Nuclear

(00:21):
Cardiology at NYU at the Langan Medical Center, and we'll
be talking about CPR, how does it work and how
was it developed as well? So these are all good
things to know when it comes to saving a life.
And Robin Rock will be chatting with our friends at
United Way, so let's kick off the show.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
There are many angles that we can and will take
in discussing heart related issues this month, but I found
this one to be fascinating. We all know what CPR is,
but how exactly does it work and how is it developed?
Why should all of us know how to save a life?
Let's bring in an expert to discuss it. Doctor Lawrence
Phillips is director of Nuclear Cardiology at ny and use

(01:02):
Langoing Medical Center. Doctor Pillips I appreciate the time, thanks for.

Speaker 3 (01:05):
Joining us, thanks to the invitation to talk today.

Speaker 2 (01:08):
Let's start off with the basics. What does CPR stand for?

Speaker 3 (01:12):
So CPR is called cardiopomera resuscitation, and the idea of
CPR is to essentially help support what's been a failing part,
to allow oxygenation to the body when the body is
not able to do it by itself. There are two
major things we think about. First is oxygen and the

(01:35):
second is essentially transportation throughout the body.

Speaker 2 (01:39):
How do we know when someone is in need of
cardioc arrest?

Speaker 3 (01:46):
So classically what we think about, especially when we're thinking
about the community, is somebody suddenly collapsing and becoming non
responsive or unresponsive, and it's important that as bystanders we
immediately jump into help because the amount of time that

(02:06):
the body, especially the brain, is that oxygen is completely
related to the likeli of having a poor outcome.

Speaker 2 (02:15):
Can CBR be performed or should it be support performed
on someone who is breathing but unconscious or is it
only on somebody who's breathing has.

Speaker 3 (02:24):
Stopped If they have not, if they're not breathing, that's
when you would start CPR and if we broaden it,
what we want to think about is when somebody collapses unresponsive,
they're not moving, they're not breathing, their heart is likely
stopped or is it really a fatal rhythm that's not
able to sustain life, And so a bystander who's there

(02:48):
is able to help them by by providing. Providing CPR
is actually increasing the chance of their survival. Without by
your CPR, in these situations, death is greater than ninety percent,
And so it's really important that first people learn how
to do it. It's very simple to do, right, and

(03:10):
they also be willing to step up to help when
they see somebody underneath it.

Speaker 4 (03:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (03:14):
I guess both of those are equally important, aren't they.
It's one thing to know how to do it, but
then refuse to step in when you need to. And
I want to get into how somebody trains and learns
how to do this properly. I guess all of us
are familiar with CPR from you know, watching movies, TV
shows and things like that, and I know it's changed
a little bit. You've got chess compressions and you've got

(03:35):
assisted breathing, is that right?

Speaker 3 (03:37):
Yeah? So in classic CPR and this is you know,
if we think about the history of CPR, different components
of this was looked at over centuries, but really in
the last century where the greatest developments made up until
the point of nineteen sixty when it was all put
together for what we classically think of a CPR, so
assisted breathing and chess compression. Now, what was found is

(04:02):
that when you combine those two, even with people that
are learning, they often are uncomfortable for many reasons doing
it when the situation arises. And so in the late
two thousands, two thousand and eight ish, the American Heart
Association said, based on good scientific data that if you're
a bystander and you're going to help that hands only

(04:26):
CPR can be as effective, meaning removing the resuscitation part
with the breathing from it and using the hands only
component of it. So of the chess compressions, and so
the way I look at it is in the medical community,
when we're involved in a resuscitation, clearly we're using ventilations
as well as chess compressions. But for a bystander, so

(04:49):
somebody in the community, for family member, even doing chess
compressions alone can increase a likely their survival by two
or three times. And so there's a big push on
the community level to train everybody and hands only CPR
so they can increase the response of this.

Speaker 2 (05:04):
And I guess the reason for that was people just
didn't want to give what you know is known as
mouth to mouth exactly.

Speaker 3 (05:11):
I think one of the big things is that they
were afraid to give mouth to mouth for any number
of reasons, especially if it's a stranger or the environment
that they're in. And then what happens is that they
don't give mouth to mouth. They found that people wouldn't
do anything at all, Right, So by removing that barrier,

(05:32):
we've found that more and more people are willing to
get in and help. That makes a big difference.

Speaker 2 (05:38):
Yeah, it's one of those things. And I mentioned I
want to ask you we'll close it out in just
a couple of minutes here talking about the easy ways
to get information and actually train for this. But I
guess it's the difference between what you know different people.
Some of us will run towards danger to try and
be the hero, and some of us will run away
from the danger. And that's an important thing when you're

(05:59):
talking about a life or death situation at that moment
where somebody needs medical.

Speaker 3 (06:04):
Assistance, absolutely, and things to think about. And I'm always
struck by this fact that when we think about cardiac
arrest for the heart stopping someone who would benefit from
cprmost over seventy percent of them occur in the home. Yeah, right,
The great majority occur in place of work or at home.
So the fear of it being a stranger is much

(06:27):
less than it being somebody either a loved one or
a colleague. And so learning the skill is really important
because we kind of think about it the movie version,
right that it's out in public that you don't know
the person, but much more likely, right, somebody that you know.

Speaker 2 (06:42):
Differences obviously between performing CPR in an adult, in a child,
or in an infant.

Speaker 3 (06:50):
Yeah. So there are different components of it, And when
we think about CPR, including the assistant breathing, there are
different ratios that you use for the breathing and the depressions.
Those are those are specific to the age of the
person or really the size of the person. When we
think about other components of it, for the reason someone's

(07:12):
having a cardiac arrest, it changes from a child to
an adult you know, adult is more likely going to
be related to the heart as the primary problem, where
an invent or a child that might be more related
to breathing or related to choking or other things that
we think about when we think globally about arresting. You know,
a lot of the traditional mouth to mouth resuscitation was

(07:35):
over a century ago when thinking about people that were drowning,
and that's where there was a lot of progress that
was made. So if we think about that evolution that's occurred,
the age of the person involved makes a big difference.

Speaker 2 (07:47):
And the training is important because they how hard, how
fast those chest compressions are given, I imagine can determine
life or death.

Speaker 3 (07:57):
It does, But I think the key take on is
going to be that for bystander CPR, if you're doing
hands only CPR, it's very easy to learn and because
the person's had a cardiac arrest, you're not hurting them
not you shouldn't worry that you're going to hurt them
more and taking that and I've taught people in a

(08:20):
few minutes how to do it, and so learning how
to do it is very easy. And if you have
the opportunity to be an environment where you can practice it,
and you know with a mannequin for example. There are
medicans and frequently that that's great, But even just watching
a video online is enough to have the basic skill
set to be able to help.

Speaker 2 (08:40):
Have a few more minutes here with doctor Lawrence Phillips,
he's director of nuclear Cardiology at NYU's land Gone Medical
Center on this American Hard Month talking about CPR. It
feels like just about everywhere we go these days, we
see those boxes on the walls, right. A ED, the
automated external defibrillator. Is that something that is used in

(09:04):
place of CPR, something that it used in conjunction with CPR.
How do we use those?

Speaker 3 (09:10):
So? AEDs are extremely important to try and reset the
heart's rhythm. So when somebody has a cardiac arrest, what
we're doing with CPR is we're trying to maintain blood
supply to the rest of the body. But that alone
is frequently not enough. And what the AED does, it's
an electrical shock that will put the heart rhythm back

(09:31):
into a normal rhythm, hopefully giving them back their pulse
and their breathing. And the key is that they're simple
instructions on these AEDs. Often they have verbal cues of
where to put the pads and what buttons the press,
similar to what I was talking about about hands only
CPR when someone's having cardiac arrest, the AEDs will not

(09:54):
give a shock to someone if they don't need a shock,
and therefore you should not be you're going to hurt
somebody by using them. Extremely important community initiatives to have
as many of these around, especially in high risk areas.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
How did somebody first come up with CPR? What was
the thinking behind it? Do you know the history of
how it was first thought of and developed?

Speaker 3 (10:20):
Yeah, so it's really fascinating. It's been again over centuries.
In early on, it was the individual components of it.
It was a discussion about how to for the breathing
part of it, how to get air in you know,
hundreds of years ago, it had to do with positioning
the body in certain ways and moving the arms around others.

(10:41):
It was inhaling or pushing air into the lungs, but
really it went into the mouth to mouth and realizing
that expired air, so air coming out of somebody's mouth,
even though they've breathed themselves already, can be sufficient to
help oxygenate somebody for the for the compression part of it,

(11:01):
early on it had to do with actually pushing on
the heart when surgical surgically to it opening up the chest.
But they found quite accidentally at times that external pressure
on the chest could artificially give a pulse or the
feeling of the blood going through the body. And then
it kind of want to stepwise fashion and bringing it

(11:23):
all together, and that was that was only sixty five
years ago or so where they realized that they could
all be put together into what we now think of
a CPR.

Speaker 2 (11:33):
And obviously it's been moderate and modernized. You've kind of
alluded to that throughout our conversation, and it's changed now
to realize that the compressions might be enough you don't
need to perform quote unquote mouth to mouth exactly.

Speaker 3 (11:47):
And I think that then that's what's going to allow
us to really expand it as broadly as we can.
The medical professionals and you know, in the hospital environment,
we're still using the full components of cardiopomet resuscitation when
we're thinking about you know, training, when people do actual
training programs like lifeguards, they're using the full training. But
as we think about the best impact, we can have

(12:10):
on the community at large. It's more and more people
gaining training and that's by using hands only CPR for bystander.

Speaker 2 (12:18):
I imagine it depends, so it depends on how well
it's performed, how quickly it's performed. Do you have any
numbers on survival rates on someone who does receive CPR
when they've lost consciousness.

Speaker 3 (12:29):
Yeah, it you know, some people talk about twenty to
thirty percent survival. A lot of has to do with
the community and the environment that it's in. I think
it's important as a reminder we talk about CPR, but
one of the most important things is that somebody calls
nine to one one immediately and that you get ems
as quickly as possible, because really a lot of what

(12:50):
you're trying to do is stabilize while you get to
the advanced care and the underlying cause, especially if you
don't have an AD. So the key take comes really
all or actively emergency services as quickly as you can
start handling the CPR if that's what you know or
comfortable with full CPR, if you're able to, and if

(13:12):
there's AD using that to try and fix the rhythm.
If that's how long.

Speaker 2 (13:17):
Should someone continue to receive CPR or if you're able to.
If we're trying to save a life, you continue doing
it until you know first aid arrives at, the ambulance
gets there.

Speaker 3 (13:28):
Or whatever exactly. You try to keep going as long
as you can, hoping to be able to continue until
more advanced care is about.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
I know parents are often offered or advised to get
CPR classes, you know, when when they give birth and
things like that. I've seen you point out that usually
you're going to need to use CPR because somebody is
in distress, and you mentioned it earlier. Usually it's somebody
that you know.

Speaker 3 (13:56):
It is. And I think when you ask about parents,
I think it's im where skill to have a CPR
first daid when you have children, to understand more about
what's going on, to learn that foundation, get it that
those skills hopefully are very rarely needed, but to have

(14:17):
them if you happen to unfortunately be in that situation,
it's good. Be key.

Speaker 2 (14:21):
You mentioned even just knowing the basics YouTube video sometimes
would suffice and help save a life. What are the
easiest places to get the information and actually sign up
for classes to do it properly?

Speaker 3 (14:34):
Yeah, the American Heart Association have great resources online on
their website that's Heart dot org and that shows even
sixty second videos on how you can learn handholding CPR,
and that's great for everybody in the public to learn
if you're looking for more complete courses and to sit

(14:55):
for several hours. For example, the Red Cross the Heart
Association both have X courses that you can take and
the sign ups would be on their website.

Speaker 2 (15:03):
How young a kid do you do you suggest should
learn something like this and it could be beneficial to them.

Speaker 3 (15:08):
Well, I think it's the biggest push that I've seen
has to do a high school student and a requirement
as part of their high school education to get CPR
training and that they need it for graduation. So there,
I think maybe over two dozen states now require it,
and I think that that's a great skill to kind
of just incorporate it into general education so you can

(15:30):
do it younger. But I think that the having certain
stages where we just want our entire community to know it,
because I said, you never know when you're going to
need the skill, and understanding it and being able to
jub into action really makes it difference.

Speaker 2 (15:44):
Doctor Lawrence Phillips, Director of Nuclear cardiology at NYU's Langone
Medical Center. Really appreciate your time, Really appreciate the explanation
and the information. Thank you so much. Be well.

Speaker 3 (15:54):
Thank you.

Speaker 5 (15:55):
February is American heart mon Heart disease is a leading
cause of death in the United States. High blood pressure,
high cholesterol, smoking, diabetes, obesity, and lack of exercise can
increase your risk for heart disease. Men over forty five
and postmenopausal women have a higher risk of coronary artery
disease or CAAD. Black and Hispanic adults of all ages

(16:18):
are at increased risk. CAD is the most common form
of heart disease and a major cause of heart attack.
CAD occurs when plaque builds up along the walls of
the heart's arteries, causing them to narrow and limit blood flow.
Your doctor can use calcium scoring with CARDIACCT to identify
the presence, location, and extent of plaque build up. Ask

(16:40):
your doctor if you're at risk for coronary artery disease
and find out if cardiac screening is right for you.
For more information, visit radiologyinfo dot org. This health reminder
is from the Radiological Society of North America.

Speaker 6 (16:55):
Tom has been a tat here for over forty years.
One day, I think one of those two asked the
question and he didn't remember the answer. And I also
noticed that he was letting his class out earlier than
they were supposed to let out. I was really starting
to worry.

Speaker 4 (17:08):
Levi and I talked about how it would change our lives,
but he was there beside me.

Speaker 7 (17:14):
When something feels different, it could be Alzheimer's. Now is
the time to talk. Visit alz dot org slash our
stories to learn more. A message from the Alzheimer's Association
and the AD Council.

Speaker 4 (17:25):
Hi, it's Robin Rock and today I want to talk
a little bit about two to one one Metro Chicago.
And I've got a couple of very special guests here
to talk about that today, Jackie Rosa and Scherie Lee.
So Jackie, I want to ask you first a little
bit more about two on one Metro Chicago. Tell me
more what it's all about.

Speaker 8 (17:42):
Two one one is really a special line for the
City of Chicago. It provides a live hotline with a
live navigator on the other end to connect Chicagoans to
social services across the city of Chicago and suburban Cook County.
So you know, really this came about right after the pandemic.
You know, realizing when the pandemic hit, a lot of

(18:02):
people in Chicago didn't know where to go to get
resources in the midst of the pandemic, and so there
was a bunch of different numbers. So whether you were
looking for a food bank, or you were looking for childcare,
or you were looking for mental health resources, you know,
you have all these different numbers to call, and often
there isn't somebody on the other line to answer the call.
And so to one one what it really does is

(18:24):
provide that network of a live navigator on the other end.
So you're just calling one number. You're just calling to
one one. You have a live navigator. The navigator is
able to hear directly from you about the issues that
you're facing and what services are available to you, and
then the navigator connects you to those social services. So
it's a really great centralized number that you can call.

(18:47):
It makes it easy, it provides that live person on
the other end that's really empathetic, and it connects you
to at the end of the day, a quality social
service in Chicago that is going to help improve the
quality of your life.

Speaker 4 (19:00):
Let's talk a little bit about the process when someone
contacts two one one. Sure, do you want to talk
about it?

Speaker 9 (19:05):
Sure, I'll talk a little bit about two one one here.
So two one one Metro Chicago is a free hotline.
We operate twenty four seven, three hundred and sixty five
days a week. Essentially, we do have our navigators that
are there. They are empathetic to the needs of our community.
All of our navigators are from the Cook Counting community,
so they relate to the needs of our callers. And

(19:26):
they are also there to provide referrals for housing, for utility,
assistance for food. Those are some of the services that
we are assisting our callers with. So essentially, they can
call us, they can text us at two one one,
and they can also visit our website by webchat. There's
always someone there to be able to assist and offer
you a census so for the phone for these.

Speaker 4 (19:48):
Needs, you know, and I think that's pretty amazing. Not
only is there a real person that you can reach
out to, which I think a lot of people find
pretty comforting, but there's answers for the problems. Yes, wow, Okay,
so now what are the greatest needs that people have
who contact two one one, what are they looking for?

Speaker 9 (20:06):
So some of our top needs that we have seeing
this housing, utility, payment assistance, income and employment support, also
accessing foods. So those are some of the top needs
that we are seeing right now. We are assisting the
Chicago Land area and this is our Cook County area,
So these are some of the needs that we're seeing
in that area.

Speaker 4 (20:24):
I don't know if a lot of people know this,
but this is a public and private partnership that made
this happen. So how did United Way do that? That's
a pretty big deal.

Speaker 8 (20:34):
Yeah, no, it is a huge deal, And I think
that that's what makes us numbers so special because it
is a free service that's being provided and funded by
you know, dollars that are coming from the City of
Chicago as well as Cook County, as well as private
dollars that are coming from a different variety of philanthropic
institutions in the city that really see a need for this.
So I think that by having a variety of different
funding streams, we're able to provide this service free of

(20:58):
charge for people that live in Shiticgo and suburban Cook County.
I think that you know that again, it's that public
private partnership that's so needed, especially in this time, to
know that there's a different funding streams to be able
to provide the service.

Speaker 3 (21:13):
You know.

Speaker 4 (21:13):
And I'll bet Jackie that a lot of people are
shocked that this is a free service. You said free
and a lot of and when you talk about all
the help that's provided, Yeah, that's that's crazy.

Speaker 8 (21:25):
It's crazy, but it should be the standard, right. I
think that this is something that again we're really proud
of the fact that it is a free service and
that it's accessible to people's accessible twenty four to seven.
And I think again, when people are calling this line,
they know that you're going to be able to call
at your earliest convenience. It's not like, oh, you know what,
I have to work my nine to five job and

(21:47):
this call center is closed at four o'clock, so I
didn't get to call because I was working. Again, I
think being able to provide a twenty four to seven
service is able to meet people where they're at. And
also the fact that it's free, it removes one less
barrier to you being able to get the social service
that you need.

Speaker 9 (22:02):
Srea.

Speaker 4 (22:03):
I want to ask you. Since you guys got started
during the pandemic, I'm sure things have evolved and changed
a lot since then, right, what kind of impacts have
you seen over the past couple of years.

Speaker 9 (22:13):
The impacts have been huge, and the last two years
we have been able to service over three hundred and
twenty thousand contacts, essentially surpassing even our goals along It's
a huge impact for us, considering that a centralized health
line for us is about essentially their health needs, their
social needs. So we're just anticipating them to grow even more.

(22:33):
So we want to be there for our community. So
we are very excited at the growth of the organization
over the two years, and we're just looking to grow
even more.

Speaker 4 (22:42):
Okay, so tell me what that means. Do you have
a goal?

Speaker 8 (22:44):
I think that's a great question. I think it's one
growing but also being mindful of the capacity of the
organizations that are providing those services to be able to
deliver on them. So I think we're thinking about both simultaneously.
We know there's a need, but we also want to
make sure that we're equipping the organizations that are providing
that need with the right resources, and so I think
that that's something that Unitedwaight does really well because not

(23:07):
only are we managing two one one and we house
to one one, but we also work with helping to
provide funding for the organizations across both Chicago and Cook
County to meet the need.

Speaker 4 (23:19):
So if there are businesses right now, individuals who are
hearing this and saying, you know what, I love this
and I want to help other people I want to help,
how do they help support you?

Speaker 9 (23:29):
Great?

Speaker 8 (23:29):
They can go to two one one Metro Chicago dot org.
They can learn more about the work that two on
one Metro Chicago is doing as well as donate.

Speaker 4 (23:38):
That's perfect, that's awesome, ladies. Thank you so much for
being here and this is just such great information and
I'm so glad that you shared because I'm sure this
is news to a lot of people that this is
a free service and it's available.

Speaker 9 (23:49):
Thank you for having us.

Speaker 6 (23:51):
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Speaker 4 (23:57):
Trust water bottles in a flashlight to save the but
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accessible shelter.

Speaker 5 (24:06):
When the flood letters rise, I'll be up in the
attic with twenty cans of beans. It's a recipe for disaster.

Speaker 6 (24:12):
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Get started at Ready dot gov slash Older Adults Brought
to you by FEMA in the Ad Council.

Speaker 1 (24:20):
Thank you so much for listening and thank you for
tuning into the Weekly Show here on iHeartRadio ninety three
point nine Light FM on A three five Kiss FM
and Rock ninety five to five. If you missed this
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(24:42):
at iHeartMedia dot com and I will try my best
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Weekly Show. Thank you so much, and thank you all
for listening and for making a difference right here in
our city and suburbs. Take care and have a great weekend.