Students launch ‘unprecedented’ effort to teach CPR in Texas

By Alex Branch

CPR Class

 

Would you know how to react in a cardiac emergency? About 70 percent of Americans say they would feel helpless because they do not know how to perform CPR.

UNT Health Science Center medical students are doing their part to change that in Texas.

About 50 Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine students will team with hundreds of students from nine Texas medical schools on Saturday to offer free CPR training simultaneously in 10 cities. This unprecedented effort, coordinated with the Texas College of Emergency Physicians, will include six training sites in Fort Worth.

“The most critical time for someone in cardiac arrest is the three to five minutes before paramedics get there,” said Matt Millington (TCOM ’18), a student organizer. “The more people who know how to correctly perform simple chest compressions, the better outcomes we’ll have in our community.”

Training at the Texas Two-Step How to Save a Life Campaign could take between 5 and 20 minutes, depending on whether the person learning wants a quick lesson or to stay and ask questions. Medical professionals from MedStar and JPS Health Network have also joined the effort.

Students chose the training sites — like YMCAs and Hulen Mall — because there are likely to be a lot of people passing by, said Faroukh Mehkri, a third-year TCOM student and co-chair for the Texas College of Emergency Physicians Medical Student Committee.

“We have found that it is sometimes hard to schedule people to show up and learn CPR,” Mehkri said. “But if we are there in high foot-traffic areas and people realize they can stop and take a few a minutes to learn a life-saving tool, they really want to do it.”

CPR training sites in Fort Worth on Feb. 6

TCU Brown Lupton Student Union
2901 Stadium Drive
11 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Hulen Mall
4800 S Hulen St.
11 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Fort Worth Mardi Gras Run
395 Purcey St.
6:30 a.m. to 10 a.m.

YMCA Benbrook
1899 Winscott Road
12 p.m. to 3 p.m.

Ryan Family YMCA
8250 McCart Ave.
1 p.m. to 5 p.m.

YMCA NorthPark
9100 Beach St.
12 p.m. to 4 p.m.

Recent News

Selina Tucker
  • Community
|May 16, 2025

A passion for helping others through research motivates CBTS graduate to dig deep

Selina Tucker, who graduates this semester with a Ph.D. in integrative physiology from The University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth’s College of Biomedical and Translational Sciences, had an interest in science and medicine from an early age, but she was unsure where her curio...
Berenice Benayoun
  • Community
|May 15, 2025

NBAAD Symposium will feature geroscience expert and highlight student training in aging research

By 2050, 21% of the global population—about 2 billion individuals— will be older than 60, driving a sharp rise in age-related diseases. The University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth is helping lead the charge against this growing crisis. On Tuesday, May 20, sci...
Image2
  • Community
|May 15, 2025

Army, Navy and Marine veteran and former physician assistant adds one more title: osteopathic physician

Meet Bradley Vander Zanden. He’s currently in the United States Navy, formerly in the United States Army, a former Marine, a former physician’s assistant and now he’s adding one more title to the prestigious list: osteopathic physician. Vander Zanden, after a nearly 20-year military career, is...
Cheyenne Conger Ws
  • Community
|May 15, 2025

PT students go pro: Clinical rotations bring major league experience

When third-year physical therapy students Cheyenne Conger and Stephanie Budrock walked into their final clinical rotations at The University of North Texas Health Science Center at Fort Worth’s Department of Physical Therapy, they didn’t step into a typical outpatient clinic. Instead, they found...