UMEM Educational Pearls

Category: Critical Care

Title: Prognostic Factors in Cardiac Arrest

Keywords: OHCA, ROSC (PubMed Search)

Posted: 12/6/2016 by Rory Spiegel, MD (Updated: 3/29/2024)
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The prognosis of patients who experienced OHCA, who have not achieved ROSC by the time they present to the Emergency Department, is dismal. As such, it behooves us as Emergency Physicians to identify the few patients with a potentially survivable event. Drennan et al examined the ROC data base and identified the cohort of patients who had not achieved ROSC and were transported to the hospital. The overall survival in this cohort was 2.0%. Factors that predicted survival were initial shockable rhythm and arrest witnessed by the EMS providers. Patients arriving to the ED without ROSC, that had neither of those prognostic factors had a survival rate of 0.7%. 

References

Drennan IR, et al. A comparison of the universal TOR Guideline to the absence of prehospital ROSC and duration of resuscitation in predicting futility from out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. Resuscitation (2016)