Initiatives to Improve Cardiac Arrest Management

Mads Wissenberg, MD Department of Cardiology Gentofte Hospital, University of Copenhagen Niels Andersens Vej 65 2900 Hellerup, Denmark Post 635MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Mads Wissenberg, MD
Department of Cardiology
Gentofte Hospital, University of Copenhagen
Niels Andersens Vej 65
2900 Hellerup, Denmark Post 635

MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study?

Answer: Our main findings from this nationwide study are that during a 10-year period where several national initiatives were taken to increase bystander CPR and improve advanced care, bystander CPR increased more than a two-fold from 21 % in 2001 to 45% in 2010. In the same period survival on arrival at the hospital increased more than a two-fold from 8% in 2001 to 22% in 2010, and 30-day survival more than a three-fold from 3.5% in 2001 to 11% in 2010.

MedicalResearch.com: Were any of the findings unexpected?

Answer: Changing the habits of a whole population is difficult and we were therefore surprised that the initiatives taken during the last decade seems to have made such an impact on bystander CPR rates and patient survival.

MedicalResearch.com: What should clinicians and patients take away from your report?

Answer: The main message from this study is that national initiatives to improve cardiac arrest management seem to have an impact with an increase in bystander CPR rates and survival rates.

MedicalResearch.com: What recommendations do you have for future research as a result of this study?

Answer: The next steps in this research should focus on finding the best community approaches to improve cardiac arrest  management even further. And despite the large increase in patients receiving bystander CPR, more than half of the patients did not receive bystander CPR and the use of AED before arrival of emergency medical service was very low throughout the study period. Hence, there is still room for improvements in order to increase the survival following out-of-hospital cardiac arrest even further.

MedicalResearch.com: Can these findings be translated to other countries like the US?

Answer: The fact that a series of initiatives seems to have changed the habits of a nation and increased the number of people who are able and willing to perform resuscitation can most likely be used in other countries with a similar culture.

Citation:

Wissenberg M, Lippert FK, Folke F, et al. Association of National Initiatives to Improve Cardiac Arrest Management With Rates of Bystander Intervention and Patient Survival After Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest. JAMA. 2013;310(13):1377-1384. doi:10.1001/jama.2013.278483.

Last Updated on December 21, 2014 by Marie Benz MD FAAD