Cardiac arrests on the job are rising and often fatal. Workers and employers are not prepared for the risk

In January 2023, Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin's shocking collapse during an NFL Monday Night Football game due to cardiac arrest placed a high-profile spotlight on a concerning, and growing, statistic: each year, more than 10,000 people suffer from cardiac arrests in U.S. workplaces.  

But unlike Hamlin, whose unique workplace allowed him to receive immediate treatment from NFL and team medical professionals who administered CPR and used an automated external defibrillator to revive him before he was transported to a nearby hospital, many other workplaces across the U.S. are not prepared to address cardiac arrest so easily, nor are the workers themselves. 

In fact, recent data from the American Heart Association found that seven in 10 Americans say they feel powerless to act during a cardiac emergency. That statistic is exacerbated by the chilling stats that surround cardiac arrests that are not immediately addressed: 90% of nearly 350,000 instances of cardiac arrests each year outside of a hospital are fatal, and every minute that someone who suffers cardiac arrest does not receive CPR, their chance of survival drops by 10%. 

In the wake of Hamlin's cardiac arrest and subsequent recovery that saw him return to NFL action the following season, the American Heart Association has worked with him to increase those survivability rates, especially on fields and during other sporting events.

There has been progress: earlier this year, AHA reported an increase from 33% to 39% in "bystander confidence" to perform CPR since Hamlin's story, and subsequent efforts by the AHA and others to increase awareness. Now, AHA says 17.7 million more Americans feel they have the knowledge and training to act in a lifesaving emergency.

AHA says there is more progress to be made, and it has teamed up with payroll giant ADP to increase the numbers on cardiac emergency readiness inside traditional corporate workplaces. 

"Everyone can be a lifesaver; this is a superpower that everyone should know," Nancy Brown, CEO of the American Heart Association, said at the CNBC CEO Council Summit in Arizona on Tuesday. 

ADP has a unique position to help spread that message among workers, with roughly one-in-six American workers using the company's technology in the workplace.  

Maria Black, the CEO of ADP, said that after hearing the stats around cardiac arrest in the workplace from Brown and the AHA, she felt there was something she and ADP could do about that, not only in her own company but for its clients. 

Working alongside AHA, ADP now offers hands-only CPR education directly through its mobile app, which Black said is already used by upwards of 14 million workers monthly to check their pay as well as access HR and payroll tools. That education includes a playbook and a toolkit about CPR. 

"The way I think about it is if it changes just one life, and candidly I hope it never happens, but if it does whether that's at a worksite or it's in somebody's personal life, I think that's incredible," Black said. 

Brown shared an example of just how impactful that knowledge can be: In 2023, the AHA helped facilitate CPR and AED training for all of the NFL teams and their management. Just several days after that training, then Los Angeles Rams defensive coordinator Raheem Morris was on vacation with his family in Las Vegas when he saw a young boy drowning in a hotel pool. When the boy was taken out of the pool, he had no pulse. Morris, thanks to his training, was able to assist a lifeguard and a doctor who was also at the pool to save the child's life. 

"There isn't fast enough action to save someone," Brown said. 

Correction: Cardiac arrests in the workplace are a growing concern. An earlier headline on this article misidentified the medical condition.