The Latest: Woman says Dr. Heimlich used namesake manoeuvr

CINCINNATI – The Latest on Dr. Henry Heimlich, who’s credited with developing the Heimlich manoeuvr, using it on a woman at his living centre (all times local):

4:45 p.m.

A Cincinnati woman says she was having trouble breathing when the man credited with developing the Heimlich manoeuvr stepped in to save her life.

Patty Ris (riss) says food had gone down her windpipe when Dr. Henry Heimlich stood behind her at the senior living centre where they live.

Ris says Heimlich could tell she wasn’t breathing. She says she thinks she would have died without his intervention on Monday.

The 96-year-old Heimlich said Friday he was having dinner when he looked over at the woman sitting next to him and could see her face was growing pink and she was obviously choking. He says he got up behind her and began the technique.

Heimlich says it was the first time he’d used his own manoeuvr, and his son agreed. But Heimlich said in a 2003 BBC interview he had used it three years earlier.

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10 a.m.

The 96-year-old Cincinnati surgeon credited with developing the Heimlich manoeuvr says he recently used it for the first time to save a woman choking on food at his senior living centre.

Dr. Henry Heimlich told The Cincinnati Enquirer (http://cin.ci/1U0lAx2) in an interview Thursday he has demonstrated the well-known manoeuvr many times but had never before used it on a choking person.

An employee at the Deupree House in Cincinnati says the retired chest surgeon was in the room when an 87-year-old woman began choking. The employee says Heimlich dislodged a piece of hamburger from the woman’s airway and she quickly recovered.

Heimlich says it made him appreciate how wonderful it has been “to be able to save all those lives.”

Heimlich’s son agreed it was the first time he had used the manoeuvr. But Heimlich said in a 2003 BBC interview he had used it three years earlier.