Mary M. Newman, MS

Mary M. Newman, MS, co-founded the Sudden Cardiac Arrest Foundation (SCAF), a national nonprofit organization, in December 2005. She served as President & CEO from January 2006 through January 2025. She now consults with SCAF, providing mentoring and information, and manages SCAF's Cardiac Arrest Survivor Alliance (CASA), an online community for people affected by cardiac arrest, which she co-founded.

In addition, Newman is a co-founder of the national “Call-Push-Shock” movement. She also is the recipient of the American Heart Association (AHA) 2021 Resuscitation Champion Award.

Previously, she served as Executive Director of the National Center for Early Defibrillation at the University of Pittsburgh and as faculty in its Department of Emergency Medicine. Prior to this, she was research coordinator for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest studies at Krannert Institute of Cardiology, Indiana University School of Medicine.

Newman is author of numerous articles published in peer-review journals, trade journals, newsletters, and the popular press. She is also co-author of Challenging Sudden Death: A Community Guide to Help Save Lives. She was a contributing author and editor of the Journal of Emergency Medical Services (JEMS) from 1980-2016. She created the Chain of Survival metaphor, which was later adopted by the American Heart Association (AHA) and numerous organizations worldwide.

Newman co-founded the Citizen CPR Foundation (CCPRF) and served on its Board of Directors for 17 years. She was founding editor of the CCPRF/AHA publication, Currents in Emergency Cardiac Care. She served on multiple expert panels and committees of government and national nonprofit organizations, including the DOT National Standard Curriculum on Bystander Care, CPR curriculum development for the American Red Cross, and the AHA AED Task Force. She was a volunteer emergency medical technician with the Chester, NJ, Fire Department, and a volunteer AHA CPR instructor and NJ AHA Affiliate Faculty member. In addition, she was a project manager for the ACT (Advanced Coronary Treatment) Foundation in Basking Ridge, NJ.

Mary graduated magna cum laude from the University of Cincinnati with a degree in Community Health Planning and Administration and completed EMT training at Northeastern University. She pursued a Masters in Public Health with a concentration in epidemiology at Indiana University, and received a Master of Science in Non-Profit Management with a focus on nonprofit branding at Robert Morris University.