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Date Published: August 25, 2025
A cardiac arrest happens when the heart stops beating or beats too ineffectively to circulate blood to the brain and other vital organs. If someone nearby has a cardiac arrest and their heart stops beating, they need help. What would you do?
Cardiac arrest incidents in a public setting are more likely to be witnessed by a bystander. But according to the bystander effect — a psychological theory that people are less likely to help someone in need if others are present — can hinder a person’s ability to get immediate help. A key factor influencing bystander intervention is a lack of training.
A study in Biological Psychiatry says bystanders are more likely to offer aid if they have watched others model the behavior and feel competent to assist.
Administering bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) before the arrival of an ambulance significantly increases a patient’s chance of survival. According to the 2023 bystander CPR statistics in the Cardiac Arrest Registry to Enhance Survival Annual Report, CPR was initiated after 49.7% of bystander-witnessed events (excluding nursing homes or healthcare facilities). The report also states that patients with a bystander-witnessed cardiac arrest were over three times more likely to survive.
The benefits of performing bystander CPR far outweigh the risks. Don’t wait for help to arrive. Here’s how being prepared to administer bystander CPR could save someone’s life.
Bystander CPR is defined as CPR performed by a person who is not responding as part of an organized emergency response system to a cardiac arrest.
If you are not trained in full CPR, administering hands-only CPR (CPR without rescue breaths) can be just as useful to deliver bystander CPR. People who receive hands-only CPR from bystanders are more likely to survive than individuals who did not receive any intervention.
When you think of someone administering CPR, you likely think of them pushing on a person’s chest at intervals and administering mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. This method would be considered regular (traditional or conventional) CPR.
Another form of CPR, known as hands-only CPR, does not require mouth-to-mouth breaths. Both forms are valuable and benefit victims of cardiac arrest.
Bystanders can perform either of these types of CPR. Here’s how they differ:
Hands-only CPR benefits bystanders because it is easy to learn and remember, especially outside of medical settings. Be prepared by knowing when to perform CPR.
A heart attack and cardiac arrest are not the same. A heart attack is a blockage of the blood vessels that supply oxygen to the heart muscle. The person may be awake, and if left untreated, the heart attack may progress to cardiac arrest. Cardiac arrest is when the heart stops beating or beats too ineffectively to circulate blood to the brain and other vital organs.
A person who experiences cardiac arrest needs immediate care. The faster the response time in a cardiac arrest, the better the chance of survival and reduction of long-term complications. The cardiac arrest chain of survival reminds bystanders how to respond during a cardiac arrest incident.
The cardiac arrest chain of survival is a term used to describe a series of time-sensitive interventions that must be performed to increase the survival outcome. There are six steps in out-of-hospital cardiac chain of survival:
No one ever expects emergencies to occur as they go about their day, so it is important to learn bystander CPR beforehand. Cardiac arrest can happen anywhere — at home, school, the gym, on an airplane, in the workplace or within the community.
Drew Ashley was napping during a flight with his father, Tony, who abruptly woke him to respond to a nearby passenger experiencing a medical emergency. Both Drew and Tony are American Red Cross-certified instructors who regularly teach CPR, first aid and other lifesaving skills. When faced with an emergency, their training kicked in, and they reacted. “It was like muscle memory,” Drew recalled. “Once we recognized what was happening, instinct took over, and we followed our training. It’s one of those situations you never forget.”
After 45 minutes of administering bystander CPR, the passenger was hospitalized. They later reported the passenger survived and is doing okay. Drew credits his CPR training. “Thank God we were there — no one else on the plane knew what to do,” Drew says. “If we hadn’t been, the situation may have been worse.”
CPR training can give you the skills and confidence you need to act in an emergency. Learning to perform CPR takes just a few short hours but can change a life forever. The American Red Cross offers online, in-person, and hybrid options for learning CPR.
Training Services is a division of the American Red Cross. Our mission is to advance lifesaving education so you are better to prepared. Our robust training curriculum includes CPR and AED, First Aid, Basic Life Support (BLS), Babysitting and Child Care, Lifeguarding, Water Safety and more.
