Resuscitation
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Multicenter Study
Duration of hospital participation in Get With the Guidelines-Resuscitation and survival of in-hospital cardiac arrest.
Get With the Guidelines (GWTG-R) is a data registry and quality improvement program for in-hospital cardiac arrest (IHCA). It is unknown if duration of hospital participation in GWTG-R is associated with IHCA outcomes. ⋯ Duration of hospital participation in GWTG-R was significantly associated with survival of the IHCA event, but not with survival to discharge. In VT/VF arrests, this association may have been mediated by improvements in time to defibrillation.
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According to Norwegian law, an autonomous patient has the right to refuse life-prolonging treatment. If the patient is not defined as dying, however, health personnel are obliged to instigate life-saving treatment in an emergency situation even against the patient's wishes. The purpose of this study was to investigate how doctors' attitudes and knowledge agree with these legal provisions, and how the statutory provision on emergency situations influences the principle of patient autonomy for severely ill, but not dying, patients. ⋯ The answers indicate that the respondents include patients' refusal in an overall clinical judgement, and interpret patients' right to decline life-saving treatment in different ways. This may reflect the complex legal situation in Norway regarding patient autonomy with respect to the right of severely ill, but not dying, patients' right to decline acute life-saving treatment.
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Ischemic postconditioning (PC) with "stuttering" reintroduction of blood flow after prolonged ischemia has been shown to offer protection from ischemia reperfusion injury to the myocardium and brain. We hypothesized that four 20-s pauses during the first 3 min of standard CPR would improve post resuscitation cardiac and neurological function, in a porcine model of prolonged untreated cardiac arrest. ⋯ Ischemic postconditioning with four 20-s pauses during the first 3 min of SCPR improved post resuscitation cardiac function and facilitated neurological recovery after 15 min of untreated cardiac arrest in pigs.