Women's Cricket I Holger Neilsens Contribution To Life-Saving Can Not Be Measured

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28260, 24 April 1957, Page 15

Women's Cricket I Holger Neilsens Contribution To Life-Saving Can Not Be Measured

In the Canterbury Women’s Cricket Association’s senior competitions, which ended recently, the leading batting average was that of P. Blackler. Blackler’s average was 66.4, from 465 runs scored in 10 innings, with three not outs. She was closely followed by E. Dickson with an average of 61.4. Dickson had the highest aggregate, 737 runs for the season. After these two in the batting averages came A. Tini 48.9, S. McCaw 41.2, H. Steere 37.6, M. Rouse 36.1, and E. Woods with 35.9.

Most wickets were taken by P. Blackler, who took 63 at an average of 7.5 runs each. The lowest average was that of V. Russell, whose 17 wickets cost only 4.1 runs each, and M. Rouse, who took 14 wickets a$ a cost of 5.6 each. Other leading averages were those of J. Currie 8.0, R. Dickson 8.1, W. Clarke 8.3, R. Braun 9.1, T. Reid 9.4, and J. Rouse 9.7. First Win Although it has taken Beckenham 23 years to win the senior championship, it has derived much satisfaction from its success. The win was particularly well received by the other clubs.

Beckenham has entered a team each year since it joined the women’s association, 23 years ago, one year after the provincial association was established. In that period its closest bid to the championship was in 1951, when it was runher-up. Two players have been with the team since it was formed. They are C. Cawtheray and F. Pentecost, both of whom have gained honours for Canterbury’s firstand second elevens. S. Kilworth has been associated with the team for 20 years, ancFshe has gained Canterbury second eleven honours. The captain, E. Miles, joined the club 13 years ago, and she, too, has played for Canterbury’s second eleven. Other players in the team who have played for Canterbury are E. Dickson and R. Dickson, O. Williams, and L. Hawes.

Beckenham’s success was in the balance right up until the last game, but a good win in the final series gave it a margin of six points over Mai Moa.

HDHE recent series of classes in the Holger Neilsen method of resuscitation, organised by the Canterbury branch of the Royal Life Saving Society, aroused a new interest in Christchurch in this newest and most efficient form of life-saving. The development of resuscitation through the ages, and in the events which led to the discovery of the new method, make a fascinating study. In, the very earliest times, when almost the only form of communication was by rivers, men used ships very much less substantial than those of today. The advent of canals as a major means of transport increased the number of people who depended on the water for their living. In those circumstances, people through the ages devoted much time to devising newer and more efficient ways of preventing the water from taking a greater toll of human life. In the bad old days, a person who escaped death by drowning was liable to be revived in any one of a number of barbarous fashions. He might be strung up in the air to hang by his heels, presumably with the idea that the water would drain out of his lungs. He might be accorded the added attraction of hanging over a smoking fire, which was supposed to have even better qualities for “drying out” a nearlydrowned man.

Primitive Methods If the drowning man was a sailor, he would qualify for being rolled over a barrel, in hopes that the water would be squeezed out of him. What would happen to any air left in his lungs is not certain. To these old-time cures the old stand-by and universal cure-all bloodletting must be added. It is not recorded what percentage of the "dead” persons was successfully brought back into the land of the living after being treated in this fashion. It is thought that serious attempts to evolve more scientific methods were begihi in the last quarter of

the eighteenth century. Even at this time, the treatments were such that the sufferer might prefer to die in peace. In 1856, Dr. Marshall Hall started serious scientific research on the subject, and since then there have been several recognisd methods which have each enjoyed a fair amount of favour. Three methods have received general approval in the last 75 years—those of Silvester, Shafer, and Holger Neilsen. The system of H. R. Silvester and Professor E. A. Shafer had several drawbacks, and the bestknown and most effective of the

three methods is undoubtedly that of Holger Neilsen, of Denmark. All through boyhood, Neilsen had dreamed of being a doctor, but his family’s means were too limited for that. He entered the army, graduated with top honours from the Copenhagen Army School of Physical Culture, and dedicated himself to advancing sport in Denmark. Neilsen had his first actual experience in artificial respiration when he was in his early thirties. His patient was his own daughter. He was teaching school on one occasion when a neighbour rushed in with the news that Neilsen’s daughter was dead from the whooping-cough. He rushed home to find his daughter on a couch, blue-black in the face.

Life Saved With his frantic wife holding the child’s tongue, Neilsen applied the method of the day, Silvester’s, for what seemed an etenity before life returned to his daughter. That was the only occasion upon which he actually brought a human back to life, but the experience made him determined to find the best possible system of resuscitation, and to teach it wherever possible.

It had often struck him as odd that, although Denmark was surrounded by water, few Danes could swim. Reports of drownings among swimmers and fishermen increased his determination to find an efficient answer. He and his friends in the sporting world arranged swimming and life-saving classes in Copenhagen and elsewhere, training their pupils in the Silvester method, which was the only one known at the time.

When the improved Shafer method was introduced, Neilsen’s group switched to it, but he was all the time trying to devise something better. His main belief was that it was better to force the patient to breathe himself, and that if this could be done the recovery would be more certain, and quicker. After 1899, when he saved his daughter, Neilsen read everything possible on resuscitation, and followed all the controversy over the respective merits of the Shafer and Silvester methods. He could see drawbacks in both systems, but wondered if he could devise a better one.

Method Improved The method was built up slowly, with each idea being fitted into place as it came. First, Neilsen was struck with the idea that, with the patient lying on chest, lifting the shoulders would suck air into the lungs. But how about forcing the air out of the lungs again, with the patient in the same position? The conventional method of doing this was by pressure on the lower part of the thorax, but this could not be done by one person in conjunction with the lifting of the shoulders. This was because the two actions took part on places of the body too far apart to permit the essential rhythm. A one-man method was considered by Neilsen to be absolutely essential. Another aim was to have the system so simple that a child could use it on an adult.

It was when he was undergoing massage himself that he first noticed that pressure on the shoulder-blades forced him to exhale. It was confirmed by experts that this pressure spreads to the ribs, and so forces the air out of the lungs.

Adoption Thus was born the Danish Holger Neilsen method of resuscitation. It was immediately adopted by the Danish Red Cross in the 1930’5, but it was nqt until 1952 that the new method was finally adopted by the Royal Life-saving Society. In the early 1950’5, very extensive tests in the United States conclusively proved its superiority over the Silvester and Shafer methods. It was found that the Holger Neilsen method forces 1105 c.c. of air into the lungs, whereas the Shafer method only forces in 485 c.c. Soon after this, the Holger Neilsen method was officially adopted by the American' Red Cross and the United States Public Health Service, and its use is now worldwide.

Its great advantage over the older methods is that it requires only one operator to save the patient’s life, and no special equipment is necessary. It does not tire out the operator, who can carry on for up to four hours without feeling fatigue. In addition, the system is easy to learn, easy to remember, and easy to carry out. The Holger Neilsen method of resuscitation is suitable for tragedies other than drowning. In fact, it is effective in all cases of asphyxia, including electric shock, gas poisoning, extreme cold, and smothering.