April 5, 2011 Daniel R. Levinson Inspector General Department of Health and Human Services 330 Independence Ave.

SW Washington, DC 20201 Dear Inspector General Levinson: According to financial reports submitted to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) by the Save-ALife Foundation (SALF) of Schiller Park, IL, SALF claims to have used CDC funds to provide first aid training to students in Wisconsin public schools, primarily in Milwaukee. According to a recent e-mail from a Vice President of Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare System, Inc. which in 2004 received a $75,000 grant from SALF, presumably drawn from its CDC funding that totaled $3,335,578: Save-A-Life Milwaukee (based at Wheaton Franciscan-St. Joseph) has been in existence since 2001. Annually, the largest number of presentations done by SAL Milwaukee are to the Milwaukee Public Schools. Approximately 6,000 students were trained in 2007. According to SALF's annual corporate reports, the program provided first aid training to over 161,000 students. Contradicting both Wheaton Franciscan's and SALF's claims, in response to a recent public records request, the Milwaukee Schools are unable to locate any records associated with the program. As you were made aware in an October 11, 2010 letter, a similar situation exists re: the Chicago Public Schools (CPS), where, according to a 2009 Chicago Tribune article, SALF claimed to have trained hundreds of thousands, if not millions of students. However, in response to a federal court subpoena and FOIAs, CPS has failed to produce any legitimate training records. Further, SALF's financial reporting to the CDC was inadequate and incomplete as verified by a February 4, 2011 letter from your agency stating that SALF failed to submit a final progress report for a CDC grant. The fact that a CDC Deputy Director reportedly also worked as SALF's corporate treasurer raises reasonable concerns regarding the administration and oversight of the funds awarded to SALF by the CDC. Adding to these concerns, SALF has been the subject of numerous critical media reports, including a 2006 ABC-TV investigative report that uncovered a series of misleading claims and deceptive credentials that raise doubts about Save-A-Life's integrity, funding and training. Further, recent news stories have reported that SALF is under investigation by the Illinois Attorney General's Charitable Trust Bureau regarding financial reporting irregularities and missing assets. Finally, according to grant applications and follow-up reports submitted to the CDC, SALF claimed to have used CDC funding to establish and operate these 12 Branch Sites to provide SALF first aid training programs at these businesses and government agencies: Anderson Hospital, Maryville, IL Northern University, DeKalb, IL Cook County Public Health, Chicago, IL Alexian Brothers Medical Center, Hanover Park, IL St. John's Hospital, Springfield, IL St. James Hospital, Pontiac, IL Northbrook Fire Dept., Northbrook, IL Trenton Police Dept., Trenton, IL Children's Hospital, Chicago, IL Children's Hospital, Pittsburgh, PA O.E.M. Dade County, Miami, FL St. Joseph Medical Center, Milwaukee, WI

Concerns regarding another of the these alleged Branch Sites were reported last September: A November 2004 press release from (Rep. John) Shimkus office trumpets his support of $500,000 in federal appropriations (from the CDC) earmarked for SALF - $25,000 of which went to opening a SALF branch office at Anderson Hospital in Southern Illinois...Anderson Hospital president and CEO Keith Page replied (in an e-mail) that the hospital had received educational and training materials from SALF, but not the $25,000 cash award. However, numerous news reports and press releases describe Page receiving $25,000 in federal funds from SALF. Since the only federal dollars SALF ever received were from the CDC, the $25,000 awarded to Anderson Hospital must have originated from CDC funding. Given the discrepancies with SALF's Branch Sites at St. Joseph Medical Center and Anderson Hospital, it's reasonable to consider that similar discrepancies may exist regarding the other sites listed above. This is to request that your office contact those 12 institutions and that you review the accompanying materials to determine if the CDC funds provided to SALF for these activities were properly administered. This is also to request that I be provided with the results of your findings. To assist, page 12 of this letter lists contact information for SALF executives as well as former SALF employees who are named in the CDC records. Thank you for your attention to this matter and I look forward to your reply. Sincerely,

Peter M. Heimlich 3630 River Hollow Run Duluth, GA 30096 ph: (208)474-7283 e-mail: pmh@medfraud.info website: MedFraud.info cc: Donald White Public Affairs Specialist Office of the Inspector General Department of Health and Human Services

I. SELECTED MEDIA REPORTS RE: THE SAVE-A-LIFE FOUNDATION

Please click here for a compilation of dozens of critical media reports about the Save-A-Life Foundation (SALF). The following excerpts include information that are relevant to SALF's CDC funding. From a November 2006 ABC7 Chicago report: One of Illinois' highest profile charities teaches the Heimlich maneuver to children while maneuvering the truth to get money from government and big business. It's called the Save-A-Life Foundation and is known across Illinois as an organization that teaches schoolchildren how to respond in emergencies. For the past few years, Save-A-Life has received millions of dollars in government funds and corporate donations. An ABC7 I-Team investigation has uncovered a series of misleading claims and deceptive credentials that raise doubts about Save-A-Life's integrity, funding and training. ..."Our ultimate goal is to make (first aid training) part of driver's ed so that it becomes unified just as brushing teeth," said Carol Spizzirri, Save-A-Life founder. Spizzirri is the matriarch of the Save-A-Life Foundation, based in west suburban Schiller Park, and she has captured the attention -- and the funding -- of those who hold government purse strings. For nearly 15 years, to mayors and members of congress, she has represented herself as trained, registered nurse. Spizzirri says she got her nursing degree in Wisconsin. Currently, Save-A-Life's website and her bio claim, not only that she is an RN, but that she specializes in kidney transplants. The I-Team asked if that is true. "Not at this time," Spizzirri said. "I no longer have. I haven't registered in a number of years." According to state officials, the now-defunct Wisconsin college where Spizzirri claims to have received a nursing degree never awarded her a degree of any kind, and government records show she has never been registered as a nurse in either Wisconsin, as she told the I-Team she was, or in Illinois. "I had a nursing degree and I have worked in a hospital," said Spizzirri. Officials at the Milwaukee hospital where she claims to have been a transplant nurse say she had a paid job for a couple of years, as a patient care assistant akin to a candy striper. ...Spizzirri repeatedly tells politicians and public this story of her motivation: "My daughter was coming home from work on Labor Day of '92. She was struck by a hit-and-run, and her arm had been severely injured, and she bled to death before EMS arrived," said Spizzirri. But even that isn't true, according to police and hospital reports and an inquest by the Lake County coroner. The official record states that 18-year-old Christina Spizzirri was legally drunk at the time of the accident; and that after hosting a drinking party while her mother was vacationing in Florida, the teenager got behind the wheel and flipped her own car. Police records show there was no hit-and-run, and even though the local police didn't know emergency first aid, the teenager did not die at the scene as Carol Spizzirri contends. Medical records state that Christina died 30 minutes after arriving at the hospital. I-Team: "It was not a hit and run, was it?" Spizzirri: "Yes, it was. Oh, my gosh. I got proof of that, absolutely ... I'm done, the interview's over." After terminating that interview three weeks ago, Spizzirri's spokesperson requested that we e-mail our additional questions. So we asked for information supporting Spizzirri's often repeated story of Christina's death and any proof that Spizzirri has the medical training, licensing and expertise that she claims. They provided the I-Team with nothing. From a November 17, 2010 San Diego Reader article: (Carol) Spizzirri was a darling of politicians and bureaucrats, although it was a matter of record that she had been convicted twice for shoplifting...(It) wasnt until November of 2006 that ABC 7 News in Chicago, in the first of several broadcasts, exposed more of Spizzirris untruthful statements. She had told the station that she was a registered nurse. But the station reported that the (Wisconsin) institution from which she had claimed to receive her nursing degree had never given her one. A (Milwaukee) hospital in which she had claimed to be a transplant nurse said she had been a patient care assistant, which is akin to a candy

striper. After the announcer challenged her on the assertion that the accident was a hit-and-run, she walked out of the interview. Her abrupt departure was shown on TV. By this time, her foundation had raised about $8 million from such groups as the Illinois Department of Public Health and the United States Centers for Disease Control, and she had been paid more than $100,000 in some years. She had gathered support from such politicians as Democrat Dick Durbin, now a Senate kingpin, and Norm Coleman, then a Republican senator. Ronald McDonald had joined the fan club. Mike Brown, then head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, embraced the movement and was shown in a picture with Spizzirri...Arne Duncan, then the chief executive officer of the Chicago Public Schools, now United States Secretary of Education, had lauded what the foundation was doing for the schools and effused, Carol [Spizzirri] is one of my heroes. That praise had come two months before the series of ABC 7 shows began. From an October 11, 2010 article in The Hill: Democratic congressional candidate Timothy Bagwell is asking why the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - and his opponent Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) - steered millions of dollars toward a Chicagoarea nonprofit that's under investigation. Bagwell sent an 8-page letter to Health and Human Services Inspector General Daniel Levinson on Monday requesting that the office "review and determine" whether $3.3 million awarded to the Save-A-Life Foundation were "properly administered." Bagwell also sent a letter to Shimkus last month asking him to investigate the nonprofit for which he helped secure $1.5 million in 2004 and 2005. Save-A-Life, which provides first-aid training classes to school students, is under investigation by the Illinois Attorney General's Charitable Trusts Bureau. Bagwell also wants the inspector general to review the relationship between the nonprofit and CDC Deputy Director Douglas Browne, who served as the nonprofit's corporate treasurer from 2004 to 2009.

II. CDC FUNDING & SALF'S MILWAUKEE PROGRAM

The following information comes from SALF's CDC funding applications and financial reports. The pagination on the left of the pages corresponds to a 190-page pdf file that may be downloaded by clicking here. The transcribed information in this section is taken from documents in that file and is presented to bring to your attention numerous claims of alleged programs and planned activities by SALF, yet a paucity of detail about first aid training classes that actually took place or whether the planned programs were ever implemented. Based on these documents, the Wisconsin program appears to be mostly busy work conducted by an unnamed SALF representative in Milwaukee, presumably a Wheaton Franciscan employee. Much of the information is indecipherable, especially the ungrammatical gibberish on pages 131 and 134. These two pages are transcribed in their entirety to provide detailed examples of the quality of SALF's reporting to the CDC. Further, according to a February 4, 2011 letter from your agency, SALF failed to submit a required final progress report for one of the CDC grants described below. To my knowledge, no administrative action was taken. Therefore this is to request that you interview the CDC employees responsible for SALF's funding to determine if they did their jobs properly. Reportedly CDC Deputy Director Douglas R. Browne was SALF's corporate treasurer from 2004-2009, so presumably he can provide useful information.

p.46 BUDGET BREAKDOWN AND JUSTIFICATION SAVE A LIFE FOUNDATION H28/CCH523764-01 Consultant funding request: $7,200 Mark Mitchell, DO Medical Director St. Joseph's Hospital, Milwaukee, Wis. Provide medical oversight of training Programs (sic) p.83 TASKS FOR PHASE THREE - TO BE COMPLETED WITH CDC GRANT FUNDING Task 12: Identify states and/or communities, especially those within Illinois, to be targeted for expansion throughout Illinois and nationally. SALF will identify states and/or communities for implementation of the expansion of its programs, i.e. Maryville, IL, DeKalb, IL, Chicago. IL, Hanover Park, IL, Springfield. IL, Pontiac. IL, Northbrook. IL. Trenton, IL, Pittsburgh, PA. Miami, IL, Milwaukee, WI. These states and communities will then be assisted in the establishment of a state or regional office for continued coordination of the SALF programs. p.91 Test Sites During Phase Three, the states participating in the national expansion process will be formally selected. These states will provide a representation of highly urban to very rural areas and have been identified as Pennsylvania and Illinois. MILESTONES DUE DATES 10 Months from Award Date: Establishment of Branch sites in the targeted locations i.e., Anderson Hospital, Maryville, IL, Northern University, DeKalb, IL, Cook County Public Health, Chicago, IL, Alexian Brothers Medical Center, Hanover Park, IL, St. John's Hospital, Springfield, IL., St. James Hospital, Pontiac, IL., Northbrook Fire Dept., Northbrook, IL, Trenton Police Dept., Trenton, IL, Children's Hospital, Chicago, IL, Children's Hospital, Pittsburgh, PA, O.E.M. Dade County, Miami, FL, St. Joseph Medical Center, Milwaukee, WI. p.107 November 2004 Report As of Oct. 25, awards have been granted to branches in Miami, Milwaukee, and Pennsylvania. Milwaukee has already received their first draw down. p.110 Milwaukee, WI Training began in October. They have over 500 students scheduled to be trained. Currently have 21 Instructors Goal is to get program in the Milwaukee Public Schools much the same way that the program is in the Chicago Public Schools.

p.131 (unsigned & undated) SALF-MILWAUKEE Major Project Accomplishments/Barriers Conference with Division of Public Health in Appleton Wisconsin. The conference topic were (sic): Metropolitan Medical Response system/strategic national stock-pile activities, Cross border coordination, science of anthrax, hospitals, surveillance and pandemic influenza, integrated communication, preparedness volunteer projects, protective equipment, roles for non-bioterrorism staff. My role at this conference was to network and see if mere ways to partner with the health department to be apart (sic) of the planning and training for "preparedness training". It was a learning experience and one that I will be following up with. I have again called Mayor Barrett and Sheriff David Clarke to reschedule an appointment to discuss the city citizens corp. (sic) group. I also ask (sic) Mayor Bock to place a Mayor to Mayor call and see if he can influence the Milwaukee mayor to see the importance of the SALF. I have identified two projects that I want to achieve coming from this conference.

1) Persuade the city decision makers that SALF is an important element to assist them in their
endeavor (sic) of communicating to all citizens the preparedness trained (sic).

2) Work with more corporation (sic), village leaders, and school systems.
On October 16, and 23, 2004 Save A Life Foundation of Milwaukee will be working with the Marketing department of St. Joseph Regional Medical Center. We will have a community day that will focus on Emergency medicine and the different project (sic) of SALF. This will involve the neighborhood schools of Sherman elementary, Washington High, Custer High, Milwaukee school of Language, Park Lawn YMCA, Mary Ryan Boys and Girls and other community organizations. We will be collecting coats for the needy and giving out information on the programs that are offered here at SJRMC. Perry Medic will be our celebrity guess (sic). On October 18,2004 we will start training Sherman Elementary 3rd, and 5th graders in Save A Life for Kids. The training will be for the school year. On October 18, 2004 we will start to train students a Custer High School. We are still working out the schedule. I have a meeting scheduled at Milwaukee school of Language, French Immersion, Spanish Immersion and Washington High School for October 7, 2004.1 have worked this 3 (sic) of theses schools (sic) in the past so it will be just to develop our action plan. I have called Gwendolyn Moore who is running for congresswomen of Wisconsin to schedule a meeting. I am just waiting for her office to return the call with a date. Ms. Moore was indorsed (sic) by the school board and I would like to see if she could assist us in some of the funding. I would also like to see if you could help us get in MPS (ed: Milwaukee Public Schools) front door. Save A Life Foundation of Milwaukee working in conjunction with St. Joseph Regional Medical Center is doing a group project for employees that will demonstrate the necessity of the following areas: This is an important partnership for me and Save A Life because we have gained great respect through out (sic) the community and this will be a great opportunity to help the hospital demonstrate how we have achieved this. Why focusing on excellence is so important How does percent excellent scores (sic) tie to customer loyalty Why do hospitals sometime struggle to achieve service excellence and why is it difficult to implement SALF Milwaukee had an in-service on September. 10, 2004 to go over new policies and the manual

p.132

p.134 (unsigned) SALF Update July 2003, Milwaukee Update information: Met with Theresa Mays the director for Child Welfare in the Milwaukee area to discuss the SALF program.. Result: We talked at length regarding the different programs that are offered with (sic) SALF. She will meeting (sic) with her board within the next few weeks and she plans to get back to me to see if they can add our training in a preexisting program within her unit. Letters are being sent to major companies within the school district. Result: The letter are being sent (sic) to companies that are within the area of a public or private school asking if they will adopt the school or target a grade level for SALF training. It also informs them of schools that are at present being trained in a SALF program. Meeting with Paratech Ambulance marketing division on 7/9/04 to discuss any way that SALF can be apart (sic) of the Harley fest. Result: Meeting is scheduled for 7/9/04 Met with Linda Williams from the SDC organization. Result: Ms Williams is the employment specialist for the SDC where she trains adult clients in job readiness and time management. I discussed SALF and how this program may be very beneficial to her clients. The SDC organization is a government organization and I think that if we could get into one other (sic) will follow. Ms. Williams gave me the names of the 2 individuals within the organization that I would need to meet with Ms Marsha Kopydlowski and Ms Carter. I will follow up them both before end of week. In the process of forming a letter (sic) that will go out to all schools in early fall that I have worked with in (sic) the past 2 years requesting there (sic) help in writing a letter that can be sent to the Mayor, EMS Director and other officials. Result: The letter from the schools and/or students will ask our officials, school superintendent and others to help train school age students in a SALF program so that they may become first responders. Meeting scheduled with Joe Murray, village manager of Greendale. Result: My hope is that Mr. Murray will be able to open some avenues that I have not been able to get into. I will

ask him of different business (sic) in the Greendale area that would be able to adopt schools offer funding for their school age children and relate the importance of this program. Met with Roger Karimi from Harley Davison Result: They work with the American Red Cross and have EMT's (sic) on staff however; she will keep our information. Called Wendie Janis director of Training with Northwestern Mutual to schedule an appointment. I have met (sic) with her in October 2003 this will be a follow up meeting to see if any thing (sic) has changed with the company. Result: Waiting. Met with Genene Hibbler from Sheriff David Clarke's office to discuss SALF and CERTS Result: This was our third meeting. She identified that the Citizen Corps Councils are utilized to fully implement the CCC in the different communities. Each community will have to determine its geography boundaries and its own membership. I asked how could SALF become one of the players. I informed her that we are apart (sic) of FEMA and that we should be apart (sic) of the city's training. It is still being discussed. Have a meeting scheduled with members of the executive board of St. Joseph Regional Medical Center Foundation. Result: p.141, Progress Report and Request for Continuation Funding (PA04164) SALF St. Joseph's Medical Center, Milwaukee, Wisconsin agreed number of children to be trained 12,500 September 10, 2005 Milwaukee Department of Health, Milwaukee Office of Mayor, and Milwaukee Board of Education adding support September 27, 2005

III. WHEATON FRANCISCAN E-MAILS

The following information is excerpted from recent e-mails sent by Anne Ballentine, Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare's Vice President in charge of Communications & Public Relations. January 7, 2011 (my emphasis): Save-A-Life Milwaukee (based at Wheaton Franciscan-St. Joseph) has been in existence since 2001. Annually, the largest number of presentations done by SAL Milwaukee are to the Milwaukee Public Schools. Approximately 6,000 students were trained in 2007. SAL Milwaukee is loosely related to SAL National in large part by name. Milwaukee follows American Heart Association guidelines for CPR and its program. The most recent funding received by SAL Milwaukee from the Chicago location was in 2007 for a Scantron machine to process post-presentation knowledge/retention of participants. All Milwaukee presentations are funded through local corporate partnerships or Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare underwriting. Mark Mitchell served as Medical Director for the Milwaukee program while he was at St. Joseph. He was an independent Emergency Department physician whose group was contracted with us at the time. He was on the National SAL Board out of Chicago. The instructors who have been presenting for SAL Milwaukee have remained almost identical since the program began here. Fourteen are still with the program:

1. Doran Kemp Sr. 2. Doran Kemp II 3. Jon Voelz 4. Kurt Harthum 5. Jeffery Beamon 6. Johnnie Tangle Jr. 7. Oshi Adellabu 8. Lessandra Morel 9. Julian Gladney 10. Marvin Coleman 11. Angela Panfil 12. Shane Berry-Wright 13. Connie Skier 14. Erin Thompson January 10, 2011 (The SALF) program has been in existence here since 2001 and yes, we have had training every year through the present. January 20, 2011 (my emphasis): We do not currently receive funds from the national organization of SALF and never received ongoing funds. In our entire history we have received a gift in 2007 of $5,528.80 for a Scantron machine we previously told you about. In 2006 we received a $14,560 grant from the national SALF for educational materials and classroom instruction. This covered a small portion of our actual expenses for the project that year. Other grants we receive from outside organizations are reported by us on our own 990 and do not roll up to the parent organization.

IV. SALF's PHANTOM MILWAUKEE SCHOOLS PROGRAM

As stated, much of the information about their Milwaukee program that SALF provided to the CDC is vague, nevertheless, the reports clearly state that monies received from the CDC were used to fund the organization's Milwaukee program. Further, Ms. Ballentine clearly states that the program's primary focus was to provide first aid training for students in the Milwaukee Public Schools, a program which presumably has been in place since it was established in 2001 and has been conducting training every year through the present and that Annually, the largest number of presentations done by SAL Milwaukee are to the Milwaukee Public Schools. Approximately 6,000 students were trained in 2007. Please click here to download a pdf containing SALF's annual corporate reports from 2000 to the present. Page 128 of this file from SALF's 2005 annual report states: Wisconsin has been steadily establishing itself as the premiere SALF program for its creativity and dedication to training its children. Milwaukees St Joseph Hospital acts as the main branch for operations, training over 12,000 children last year. The same report claims that since 2001, 6,462 classes had been conducted and 161,549 students had received training and that 17,000 more Wisconsin students (15,000 in Milwaukee and 2,000 in Green Bay) were slated to be trained in 2006-07.1

1 SALF's 2006-07 annual report reproduced the two pages identically; please see p. 170 and 172 in the pdf file.

From a January 8, 2011 FOIA request I submitted to the Milwaukee Schools: Please provide me with any and all records associated with a first aid training program provided to students in the Milwaukee Schools from 2001 to the present conducted by or associated with any of the following four entities: the Save-A Life Foundation aka SALF, headquartered in Schiller Park IL; Save-A-Life Milwaukee aka SAL Milwaukee, headquartered at St. Joseph Hospital; Wheaton-Franciscan Healthcare; St. Joseph Hospital. Please include any and all documents including but not limited to financial records, training and scheduling records, employment and payroll records, and correspondence. From the March 17, 2011 response from the Milwaukee Schools: This letter is to inform you that I have no responsive records to your request. Please click here to view a copy of my FOIA request and the response letter. Please click here to view a March 20, 2011 letter to Ms. Ballentine in which I requested that she provide me with factual information to support the information she provided to Mr. Cary about the Milwaukee Schools program. I have not received any of the requested information from her or anyone else.

V. OTHER CONCERNS
1) SALF's $75,000 mini-grant to Wheaton Franciscan In her January 20, 2011 e-mail, Ms. Ballentine wrote, In our entire history we have received a gift in 2007 of $5,528.80 for a Scantron machine we previously told you about. In 2006 we received a $14,560 grant from the national SALF for educational materials and classroom instruction. That is contradicted by an October 25, 2004 press release issued by Wheaton Franciscan and a November 1, 2004 press release issued by SALF (both posted on SALF's website, now defunct) describing an October 28 media event in Milwaukee at which Carol Spizzirri awarded a $75,000 mini-grant to St. Joseph Regional Medical Center president Ron Groepper. Also present were SALF's Regional Director. Dr. (Mark A.) Mitchell, who also serves as Emergency Medical Director for St. Joseph...SALF branch facilitator Gloria Singleton-Young & Principal. C. Frederick-Stanley from Sherman Multicultural Arts School. This is to request that your office determine if the $75,000 was drawn from CDC funds provided to SALF and if so, whether it was properly administered. 2) Wheaton Franciscan's SALF web page Reportedly SALF dissolved as a business entity on September17, 2009, a fact unacknowledged by Wheaton Franciscan whose Internet site at this writing continues to host a web page about Save-A-Life Foundation that includes the following false information, first debunked in the November 2006 ABC7 report and subsequently reported by other news outlets: The Save A Life Foundation was started in 1993 by Carol Spizzirri after her 18-year old daughter Christina died in a car accident. Spizzirri learned police officers were first to arrive at the scene and instead of administering immediate basic first aid; they decided to wait for paramedic assistance. Despite her serious injuries, Christina's life may have been saved had she been treated with simple lifesaving techniques. Based on this web page and Ms. Ballentine's e-mails, Wheaton Franciscan appears completely unaware that since November 2006, SALF has been discredited in dozens of media reports, is under investigation by the State of Illinois, and filed for voluntary dissolution almost two years ago.

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3) Contradictory claims re: SALF Wisconsin coordinator's medical credentials According to the Wheaton Franciscan website, Gloria Singleton-Young is coordinator for their Save-A-Life program. Documents published by SALF and Wheaton Franciscan identify her as an RN (Registered Nurse). However, according to a November 2007 Wheaton Franciscan newsletter (my emphasis): Wisconsin Coordinator Gloria Singleton-Young recently found a real-life application for her skills. At a funeral service in her hometown Detroit church, Gloria noticed that the daughter of the deceased was crying so much that she began to choke. Gloria immediately initiated the Heimlich maneuver and CPR until the paramedics arrived, undoubtedly saving the womans life.2 Knowing that Gloria was not a registered nurse, church members marveled at her ability to perform CPR. Gloria explained the Save a Life Program to them, and the congregation is now looking to implement the program in their area.

2 I am writing a book about my father, Henry J. Heimlich MD, known for the Heimlich maneuver method to relieve foreign body airway obstruction. As a result, I've read about hundreds of choking cases. Ms. Singleton-Young's case report is the only example I've come across in which the treatment allegedly prevented a choking death brought on by extreme weeping.

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Members of SALF's executive board (2009)

PRESIDENT: Carol Jean Spizzirri 1930 W. San Marcos Blvd Space 285 San Marcos, CA 92078 SECRETARY: Rita Mullins 858 N. Virginia Lake Ct. Palatine, IL 60067 TREASURER: Douglas Browne 2851 Evans Woods Dr. Atlanta, GA 30340 DIRECTOR: John Donleavy 255 Spruce Lane Dorset, VT 05251

Former SALF employees and associates named in SALF's reports to the CDC
Mark O. Mitchell DO (SALF's former WI Regional Director & former Emergency Medical Director, St. Joseph Medical) Schumacher Group Lafayette, LA Saquan Gholar (former National Training Coordinator) Village of Phoenix Police Department Phoenix, IL Dane Neal (former SALF National Communications Director) Restaurant Radio e-mail: dane@restaurantradio.tv Vince Davis (Linked-In site) (former SALF National State Operations Director) Science Applications International Corporation Sid Blustain, Chicago Fire Department ph: (312)746-6920 Mandy Vlasz (former SALF CDC grant administrator) Arlington, VA

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