Study Backs Increasing Heart Resuscitation Times

[News]

The study contradicts previous studies, which have rejected such claims.

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[DwayneEMTP]

That study, if only examining, generally, the parameters listed seems to be a near complete waste of time.

What do they consider "survival?" The variables involved in that size of study group concerning terminal pathologies alone would be massive, but the data useless without attempting to identify them and then quantify their effect of the resusc process, right?

Though it appears obvious what this study claims to show, I'd be curious if it really shows anything at all.

[ERDoc]

The study looked at in hospital, witnessed arrests and showed improved neurological outcomes to after discharge. It's promising but cannot be extrapolated to unwitnessed arrests.

[DwayneEMTP]

But Doc, can the time given to resuc efforts be considered seriously if the reason for the arrest isn't considered? For example, my intuition states, (solid evidence, right?) that many in hospital arrests will be to an end stage pathology, unless those were disallowed in the study. And an end stage pathologies will be all over the map in regards to resuc success or failure it seems?

Just out of curiosity, what would your experience say is the the number 1, 2, and 3 reasons for in hospital, witnessed arrests?

[chbare]

Dwayne. What you are asking would be a different study.

This was a retrospective study of over 60,000 patients in over 400 hospitals. I have not seen the entire study but multilevel regression models and risk adjustments were included. The exact methods they used are not known to me.

This is how the scientific process works. Interesting literature is presented and people like you ask questions, design their own studies and over time, with enough studies that look at enough angles of an issue, a clearer picture develops.

[ERDoc]

I can't seem to find the study on pubmed anymore but here is an article with some details about the study:

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/news/fullstory_128923.html

You ask some good questions Dwayne and that is how follow-up studies are created. It was a retrospective study including over 64,000 people over 8 years so you have a pretty good sample size and which will probably minimize confounding variables. But, like Dr. Ohn says in the article it is very pt dependent but it makes you rethink resusitation. As I said, it cannot be extrapolated to unwitnessed prehospital arrests.