• The new recommendation does not include mouth-to-mouth breating.

If you need to save a life, just press on the chest.

In a major change, the American Heart Association said Monday that rapid, deep presses on the chest of an adult cardiac arrest victim until help arrives works just as well as standard CPR, which includes mouth-tomouth breathing.

Experts hope bystanders now will be more willing to jump in and help if they see someone collapse. Hands-only CPR is simpler and easier to remember and removes a big barrier for people skittish about mouth-to-mouth breathing.

"You only have to do two things. Call 911 and push hard and fast on the middle of the person's chest,'' said Dr. Michael Sayre, an emergency medicine professor at Ohio State University who headed the committee that made the recommendation.

Carrie Dickerson, a former paramedic who teaches CPR for Methodist Health System in Omaha, said she supports the change.

"By keeping it simple, people are more likely to perform it and more lives are likely to be saved,'' she said.

Hands-only CPR calls for uninterrupted chest presses -- 100 a minute -- until paramedics take over or an automated external defibrillator is available to restore a normal heart rhythm.

This action should be taken only for adults who unexpectedly collapse, stop breathing and are unresponsive. The odds are that the person is having cardiac arrest -- the heart suddenly stops -- which can occur after a heart attack or be caused by other heart problems.

In such a case, the victim still has ample air in the lungs and blood. The compressions keep blood flowing to the brain, heart and other organs, said Dr. Adrian Dreessen, medical director of the emergency department at Alegent Health Lakeside Hospital in Omaha.

Dreessen, who backs the new CPR recommendations, said the chest compressions have always been the most essential part of CPR because they help prevent brain and heart damage.

A child who collapses is more likely to primarily have breathing problems -- and in that case, mouth-to-mouth breathing should be used. That also applies to adults who suffer lack of oxygen from a near-drowning, drug overdose or carbon monoxide poisoning. In these cases, people need mouth-to-mouth to get air into their lungs and bloodstream.

Anonymous surveys show that people are reluctant to do mouthto-mouth, partly because of fear of infections, said Dr. Gordon Ewy of the University of Arizona Sarver Heart Center in Tucson, where the compression-only technique was pioneered.

Dickerson said she has taught CPR to people who were concerned about catching a disease by doing mouth-to-mouth. She said some heart attack victims will vomit, making bystanders even less likely to want to do mouth-to-mouth.

This report includes material from the Associated Press.