Today we are honored to cast a spotlight on Craig Small. A father, attorney, avid outdoorsman, sports, and music enthusiast, Craig helped to save the life of a fellow concertgoer while attending a Rolling Stones concert earlier this summer at Cleveland Browns Stadium.
During the concert, Mick Jagger was in the middle of “Heartbreaker” – a song about the heartbreak of drugs causing the death of a child. Suddenly, a middle-aged fan sitting next to Craig collapsed at his feet on the concert floor near the stage. “His eyes were open, but his stare was blank,” Craig recalled. “I laid him on his back, shook him for a response, and struggled to listen for a breath over the deafening sound of the Stones.”
Craig quickly urged his friends nearby to call for medical assistance, felt the man’s neck and wrist for a pulse, opened his shirt, and started CPR. After a few minutes of chest compressions with the assistance of others around him, the medical assistance arrived with an AED. Shortly thereafter someone detected a pulse. And thankfully, the concert’s paramedics took over, transferred him to a stretcher and onto a local hospital.
The Talmud states (Sanhedrin 37a): “Whoever saves a single life is considered to have saved the whole world.” That’s exactly what Craig did this summer by applying the skills that he reviewed just three weeks earlier while attending Dr. Iris Danziger’s “Stop the Bleed” course at the Jewish Community Center. The seminar, hosted by Buffalo Jewish Federation, covered the treatment of deep lacerations, drug overdoses, and cardiac arrest. “It was a lifesaving three-hour course, literally,” reflects Craig.
“The Stop the Bleed initiative from the American College of Surgeons was a response to the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012,” explains Dr. Danziger. After the Tree of Life Shooting in 2018, Dr. Danziger helped to organize members of the Buffalo Jewish community to become trainers. With the support of Buffalo Jewish Federation CEO Rob Goldberg, training materials were purchased, and classes soon began in the Jewish community.
Dr. Danziger has taught these lifesaving skills to thousands of people, just like Craig, equipping each one with the confidence they need to save a life. “I am so very happy that Craig had the skills and courage to save this man’s life,” Dr. Danziger reflects. Craig added, “I am grateful to Iris and to Federation, for offering this class just at the right time…I recommend that everyone take the time to learn these critical life-saving skills…any given Sunday, someone once said.”
For additional information on taking or organizing a Stop the Bleed course, please contact Iris Danziger [email protected] or Pati Ain Guzinski [email protected].
