Lifesaving Lessons
The Nurse Who Revived Toddler Inspires CPR Training Session
Jasmin Flores was driving on Interstate 91 in Rocky Hill one morning in July when she came upon an overturned Jeep, its backseat detached, and a child's car seat rolling down the highway. An injured man was struggling to get to it. The crash, which left the driver dead, had just happened.
“It was rolling far,” Flores, a psych nurse at Rockville General Hospital, said of the car seat. “It must have rolled for quite a while. I saw the guy desperately trying to chase after it. I saw it roll three times.” Flores rushed to help.
Flores said she felt no pulse on the 2-year-old, who had been in the car seat. She proceeded to administer CPR.
“I literally felt his heart jump-start,” she said.
The toddler spent some time at Connecticut Children's Medical Hospital in Hartford before fully recovering. He and his father survived the crash.
Other people gathered on the highway before medics arrived on the scene, but were unable to provide help because they did not know CPR, she said.
That's what inspired Flores to hold a community training session Thursday morning at her alma mater, the University of St. Joseph.
Students and members of the public practiced CPR on dummies and learned proper technique.
The mannequins were provided by Code One Training Solutions, a handsonly CPR training faction of the American Heart Association.
“I think CPR should be like a right of passage, something that you learn like you learn how to ride a bike,” Flores said. “Because, you don't need anything but your hands and your good intentions to save somebody's life. It's that simple.”