My Biz: Saving lives

CEDAR RAPIDS — Kate Graham says she’s not medically trained to save lives, but the training her business provides does just that.

“You never know when you’re going to need it. If I don’t save a life, I know for a fact that I’ve trained people who have.”

  Buy Photo

Graham, 81, launched National Safety Training Service from her southeast Cedar Rapids home in early 1993.

“I was in safety and loss control at a construction company,” she said. “I took on training as part of my duties so I could get out of the office.”

Offering her skills and knowledge to other employers was a logical next step.

  Buy Photo

Graham gained and maintains her certification through programs offered by the Red Cross, the American Heart Association, the National Safety Council and other nonprofits, often working as an instructor for those organizations.

“I had to get (training) on my own,” she said. “I could be an instructor and not work for anybody. I worked my way up to the point that with the Heart Association I train other instructors.”

OSHA required

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration requires most businesses to provide employee safety training every two years.

“OSHA requires it of any business that doesn’t feel like it would have help in four minutes,” Graham said. “In Cedar Rapids, we have pretty good arrival time, but most companies are more cautious. Especially construction because they can be away from town.”

The recurring classes are how Graham knows her lessons have saved lives.

“I always ask,” she said. “We get a lot of good feedback.”

Graham works without a script, customizing her four- to five-hour course to an employer’s needs.

“If I go into a business that would have certain unique hazards or special requirements, I would talk to whoever hired me and find out what’s going on,” she said.

“A company that climbs electrical poles, they’re going to have hazards up in the air that an office isn’t going to have. We use a lot of humor to keep people at ease.”

OSHA sets limits classes to 12 students per instructor. Graham hires independent contractors — she currently employs three — to help staff larger groups.

“We go into first aid,” she said. “We cover burns, bleeding emergencies, everything that OSHA requires in a first-aid class. Broken bones, CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) and AED (automated external defibrillator).”

AED growth

Graham is gratified by the results of widespread training and the availability of AEDs.

“When I first started, hardly anybody got revived” after a cardiac arrest, she said. “Now, a big part of it is the public being willing to step in as soon as somebody goes down and start CPR. It’s the first few minutes, five minutes at the latest.”

It’s usually not the employer who benefits.

“Eighty percent of the time, it’s a family member or a close friend, somebody you know,” Graham said. “We’re not only helping the company and their liability, we’re also helping families, because it could be anybody.”

  Buy Photo

Born in Chicago, Graham moved Cedar Rapids mid-1950s.

“My father worked for Wilson Packing Co. and he was transferred here,” she said, adding she’s not yet been hired to do safety training in a meatpacking plant.

Three decades on, Graham has considered selling her business, but “you meet wonderful people.”

“Every year I say it’s the last one,” she said. “But I just had a new website developed.”

Know a business that should be considered for a “My Biz” feature? Let us know by emailing mary.sharp@thegazette.com.