Hopes for cardiac arrest patients Why more people are surviving cardiac arrest

When giving their findings, the researchers weren’t sure of reasons behind this improvement. However, they strongly suspect that it could have resulted from the way hospitals are now treating cardiac arrest. Also, another reason could be because bystanders are now responding more appropriately once they see a person collapse suddenly. According to the study which first appeared in the journal Circulation, the death rate for Americans who were hospitalized for cardiac arrest in 2009 was just below 58 percent. This was down from the nearly 70 percent recorded in 2001.

The findings of the research were based on a database of national hospital discharge, which included about 1.2 million Americans hospitalized for cardiac arrest. Researchers stressed on the fact that these numbers only account for victims of cardiac arrest who survive long enough for hospital admission. Most cardiac arrest victims die even before they reach the hospital. In fact, over 300, 000 Americans experiencing cardiac arrest outside a hospital every year, not more than 8 percent of them survive.

Dr. Alejandro, Rabinstein, the senior researcher said that this statistics say nothing regarding mortality rates of all the resuscitation attempts of cardiac arrest. However, Rabinstein said that the study didn’t give a clear message as such. In case you are hospitalized for a cardiac arrest, there are better chances that you will survive.

Advancement in CPR

Cardiac arrest results after problems in the electrical activity of the heart causes it to cease beating normally and this makes it incapable of pumping blood around the body. This can be fatal within few minutes unless a defibrillator is used to restore the normal rhythm. Various advancements have been made in treatment of cardiac arrest since 2001. One of them is the recommendations to bystanders by experts to perform the ‘hands only’ CPR. This means only chest compressions without mouth to mouth breaking. This can easily be performed by layperson and more people are now more willing to do the CPR on strangers.

Suggestion by some research is that switching to the hands only CPR has assisted the inching up of cardiac arrest. The public is now able to access the so called automated external defibrillators. These are layperson friendly, portable versions of the same equipment used by doctors for shocking an arrested heart. Rabinstein said that there is a high possibility that such steps have really helped. However, victims of cardiac arrest are not just out of danger just because they make it alive to the hospital. Doctors have in recent years started doing angioplasty for some patients after they have arrived at the hospital. The researchers also said that this has also really helped a lot in cooling the rescue and improving survival rates.