"I Think She May Be Dead"

I was talking to a friend of mine the other day who is a new graduate nurse and just began working a few months ago.  We were talking about how things were going and the stress of the profession.  She then proceeded to share a lesson that she had learned.
She was working in the ER and it was her first night working with patients of her own with her preceptor only being a resource if she needed her.  Of course she was nervous and scared, because she wasn't sure she was ready (but of course all new nurses feel that way...it would be scary if they didn't).
She got report of a patient coming in via ambulance. They were stable at time of arrival.  She quickly grabbed the supplies she needed and went into see her patient.  As she entered the room she realized something wasn't right with the patient.  She looked at the patient and asked the patient for her name.  The patient didn't say anything.  She then felt for a pulse and couldn't find one and noticed that the patient's hands were ice cold.  She quickly left the room to find her preceptor.
As she was bringing her preceptor back to the room, she told the preceptor that she thought the patient was dead.  The preceptor asked her if she had felt a pulse, took her vital signs and all of the things that a nurse would normally do in that situation.  My friend said that the dyna-map was having a hard time on picking up the vital signs and she couldn't find a pulse and her hands were cold.  The preceptor then asked if she had done a sternal rub.  My friend stopped dead in her tracks and said "No I didn't think about doing that".
My friend and the preceptor did a sternal rub which made the patient sit straight up and scream "OUCH!!! What did you do that for!!! That hurt!!!!"  Needless to say the patient wasn't dead and my friend will probably always remember to do the sternal rub on her patients from here on out.