[Update Resuscitation - In-hospital Cardiac Arrest]. / Update Reanimation ­ innerklinische Reanimation.

The structure of emergency care is a key element for patients' safety in hospital. Early warning scores and the implementation of medical emergency teams (MET) can help to detect deteriorating patients early and prevent unexpected deaths. This article summarizes essential elements of a modern emergency management in hospitals.

[Training concepts for in-hospital emergencies]. / Notfälle im Krankenhaus. Ausbildungskonzepte für innerklinische Notfallsituationen.

In this manuscript training concepts, which help us to manage in-hospital emergency situations adequately, are described. International courses such as the Basic Life Support Course and the Advanced Life Support Course of the ERC are introduced. Recently the European Trauma Course has been established; technical and non-technical skills, which are necessary to treat traumatised patients, are taught in this course. The quality of the medical emergency team in the hospital should be monitored to find deficits and to improve teaching. The use of the new in-hospital emergency chart and participation in the new emergency register of the DGAI may be helpful.

[In-hospital emergency management]. / Notfälle im Krankenhaus. Das innerklinische Notfallmanagement.

5-10% of in-hospital patients are affected by adverse events, 10% of these requiring CPR. Standardized in-hospital emergency management may improve results, including reduction of mortality, hospital stay and cost. Early warning scores and clinical care outreach teams may help to identify patients at risk and should be combined with standard operation procedure and consented alarm criteria. These teams of doctors and nurses should be called for all in hospital emergencies, providing high-end care and initiate ICU measures at bedside. In combination with standard means of documentation assessment and evaluation--including entry in specific registers--the quality of in-hospital emergency management and patient safety could be improved.

[Bystander resuscitation: the impact of first aid on survival]. / Laienreanimation--Einfluss von Erster Hilfe auf das Überleben.

About 75000 people suffer from sudden cardiac arrest in Germany every year. 47% of all out-of-hospital cardiac arrests (OHCA) in Germany are bystander witnessed, but in only 16.1% is bystander-initiated CPR undertaken. In comparison to other countries, Germany is in the last third of bystander-initiated CPR activities. But bystander CPR is one of the most important measures contributing to a good neurological outcome after OHCA. New methods and concepts have to be developed to bring the knowledge of CPR to the general public in Germany and to improve the international standing.

[In-hospital emergency care of patients with in-hospital cardiac arrest]. / Notfälle im Krankenhaus. Innerklinische Notfallversorgung bei Patienten mit einem Herz-Kreislauf-Stillstand.

In German hospitals there is a growing need to offer a high quality in-hospital emergency care, because of the increasing age of the patients and to the shortening of hospital stay, as well as the increasingly complex medical procedures increases the risk of emergencies. The in-hospital emergency care should not be different from the pre-hospital emergency care concerning both the training of personnel, as well as the equipment of the team. The incidence of in-hospital emergencies or sudden cardiac arrest is not known for Germany, but the frequency in the hospitals of different levels of care differs. To ensure high quality in-hospital resuscitation and emergency treatment training and equipment of the emergency teams should be optimized and a comprehensive documentation and analysis tool should be established. For the latter task the German Resuscitation Registry will offer a high sophisticated in-hospital-emergency data collecting and analysis tool.

Choice of hospital after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest--a decision with far-reaching consequences: a study in a large German city.

INTRODUCTION: Between 1 and 31% of patients suffering out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) survive to discharge from hospital. International studies have shown that the level of care provided by the admitting hospital determines survival for patients suffering from OHCA. These data may only be partially transferable to the German medical system where responders are in-field emergency medical physicians. The present study determines the influence of the emergency physician's choice of admitting hospital on patient outcome after OHCA in a large urban setting. METHODS: All data for patients collected in the German Resuscitation Registry for the city of Dortmund during 2007 and 2008 were analyzed. Patients under 18 years of age, with traumatic mechanism, and with incomplete charts were excluded. Admitting hospitals were divided into two groups: those without the capability for percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), and those with PCI capability. Data were analyzed by multivariate statistics, taking into account the effects of mild therapeutic hypothermia treatment and PCI capability of the admitting hospital with respect to the neurological status upon hospital discharge. RESULTS: Between 2007 and 2008 a total of 1,109 cardiopulmonary resuscitation attempts were registered for the city of Dortmund, of which 889 could be included in our study. Return of spontaneous circulation was achieved in 360 of 889 patients (40.5%). In total, 282 of 889 patients displayed return of spontaneous circulation during transport to the hospital (31.7%); 152 were transported with ongoing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (17.1%). Of the total 434 patients admitted to hospital, 264 were admitted to hospitals without PCI capability and 170 to hospitals with PCI capability. Multivariate analysis demonstrated a significant influence on patient discharge with good neurological status for those admitted to PCI hospitals (odds ratio 3.14 (95% confidence interval 1.51 to 6.56)), independent of receiving mild therapeutic hypothermia and/or PCI. Compared with patients admitted to hospitals without PCI capability, significantly more patients in PCI hospitals were discharged alive (41% vs. 13%, P < 0.001) and remained alive 1 year after the event (28% vs. 6%, P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: The choice of admitting hospital for patients suffering OHCA significantly influences treatment and outcome. This influence is independent of PCI performance and of mild therapeutic hypothermia. Further analysis is required to determine the possible parameters determining patient outcome.

ROSC after cardiac arrest--the RACA score to predict outcome after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest.

AIMS: Return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC) following cardiopulmonary resuscitation from cardiac arrest (CA) depends on numerous variables. The aim of this study was to develop a score to predict the initial resuscitation outcome-the RACA (ROSC after cardiac arrest) score. METHODS AND RESULTS: Based on 5471 prospectively registered out-of-hospital CAs patients between 1998 and 2008 within the German Resuscitation Registry, calculation of the RACA score was performed by multivariate logistic regression analysis with ROSC as the outcome variable. The probability of ROSC was defined as 1/(1 + e(-X)), where X is the weighted sum of independent factors. Additional 2218 patients documented between 2009 and 2010 were used for validation of the RACA score. The following independent variables were found to have a significant positive (+) or negative (-) impact on the probability of ROSC: male gender (-0.2); age ≥80 years (-0.2); witnessing by lay people (+0.6) and by professionals (+0.5); asystole (-1.1); location at doctor's office (+1.2), medical institution (+0.5), public place (+0.3) and nursing home (-0.3); presumable aetiology of hypoxia (+0.7), intoxication (+0.5) and trauma (-0.6); and time until professionals arrival (-0.04 per minute). In a validation cohort, observed ROSC (43.8%) did not differ from predicted ROSC (43.7%). CONCLUSION: The RACA score represents a simple tool and enables comparison between observed and predicted ROSC rates based on readily available variables after CA. Thereby, the RACA score may contribute to preclinical quality assessment and may help analysing the effects of different (post)-resuscitation strategies.

Postresuscitation care with mild therapeutic hypothermia and coronary intervention after out-of-hospital cardiopulmonary resuscitation: a prospective registry analysis.

INTRODUCTION: Mild therapeutic hypothermia (MTH) has been shown to result in better neurological outcome after cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) may also be beneficial in patients after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA). METHODS: A selected cohort study of 2,973 prospectively documented adult OHCA patients within the German Resuscitation Registry between 2004 and 2010. Data were analyzed by backwards stepwise binary logistic regression to identify the impact of MTH and PCI on both 24-hour survival and neurological outcome that was based on cerebral performance category (CPC) at hospital discharge. Odds ratios (95% confidence intervals) were calculated adjusted for the following confounding factors: age, location of cardiac arrest, presumed etiology, bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation, witnessing, first electrocardiogram rhythm, and thrombolysis. RESULTS: The Preclinical care dataset included 2,973 OHCA patients with 44% initial return of spontaneous circulation (n = 1,302) and 35% hospital admissions (n = 1,040). Seven hundred and eleven out of these 1,040 OHCA patients (68%) were also registered within the Postresuscitation care dataset. Checking for completeness of datasets required the exclusion of 127 Postresuscitation care cases, leaving 584 patients with complete data for final analysis. In patients without PCI (n = 430), MTH was associated with increased 24-hour survival (8.24 (4.24 to 16.0), P < 0.001) and the proportion of patients with CPC 1 or CPC 2 at hospital discharge (2.13 (1.17 to 3.90), P < 0.05) as an independent factor. In normothermic patients (n = 405), PCI was independently associated with increased 24-hour survival (4.46 (2.26 to 8.81), P < 0.001) and CPC 1 or CPC 2 (10.81 (5.86 to 19.93), P < 0.001). Additional analysis of all patients (n = 584) revealed that 24-hour survival was increased by MTH (7.50 (4.12 to 13.65), P < 0.001) and PCI (3.88 (2.11 to 7.13), P < 0.001), while the proportion of patients with CPC 1 or CPC 2 was significantly increased by PCI (5.66 (3.54 to 9.03), P < 0.001) but not by MTH (1.27 (0.79 to 2.03), P = 0.33), although an unadjusted Fisher exact test suggested a significant effect of MTH (unadjusted odds ratio 1.83 (1.23 to 2.74), P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: PCI may be an independent predictor for good neurological outcome (CPC 1 or CPC 2) at hospital discharge. MTH was associated with better neurological outcome, although subsequent logistic regression analysis did not show statistical significance for MTH as an independent predictor for good neurological outcome. Thus, postresuscitation care on the basis of standardized protocols including coronary intervention and hypothermia may be beneficial after successful resuscitation. One of the main limitations may be a selection bias for patients subjected to PCI and MTH.

[In-hospital resuscitation--definitely better than in the field?]. / Innerklinische Reanimation--Alles besser als draußen?

Despite favorable conditions, in-hospital resuscitations do not lead to higher survival rates than those in the field. Recent studies show an average survival rate of 18%. One of the most important predictors for an unfavorable survival is a delay of defibrillation of greater than 2 minutes, which leads to a reduction of ROSC, 24-hour survival and survival to discharge. With respect to the guidelines of the European Resuscitation Council for cardiopulmonary resuscitation from 2010, track and trigger systems to detect the deteriorating patient should be used. Of note, the survival rate for in-hospital resuscitation is significantly lower over the weekend and at night than on workdays and during the day--most likely because fewer staff is available. More than 80% of patients with an unexpected cardiac arrest exhibit cardiopulmonary and neurological abnormalities prior to this event. A Medical Emergency Teams (MET) could intervene in such cases and thus decrease the likelihood of cardiac arrest. METs are more time-consuming and more labor-intensive than simple resuscitation teams, but these resources are well spent, as unexpected admissions to the intensive care unit can be avoided and patients receive treatment before their conditions deteriorate. Hospitals should therefore analyze and evaluate their internal emergency response plans.

A national resuscitation registry of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in Germany-a pilot study.

BACKGROUND: Survival rate after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) has not significantly increased over the last decade. However, survival rate has been used as a quality benchmark for many emergency medical services. A uniform resuscitation registry may be advantageous for quality management of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). This study was conducted to evaluate the establishment of a national CPR registry in Germany. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A prospective cohort study was performed that included 469 patients who experienced OHCA requiring CPR in the metropolitan area of Dortmund, Germany. Cardiac arrest was defined as concomitant appearance of unconsciousness, apnoea or gasping and pulselessness. All data were collected via a secure and confidential paper-based method as the data set 'Preclinical care'. RESULTS: Quality of data was classified as 'good' in 33.4%, 'moderate' in 48.4%, and 'bad' in 18.2% of the patients, respectively. Sixty-two percent had OHCA in private residences, 24% of the patients had a first monitored rhythm of ventricular fibrillation (VF) or ventricular tachycardia (VT), 35.2% had return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC) on scene, and patients presenting VF/VT as the first monitored rhythm had higher ROSC rates (51.3%) compared to patients with asystole (22.6%). CONCLUSION: The data set 'Preclinical care' proved to be congruent with the Utstein style, provided further information for national and international comparisons, and enabled a detailed analysis. Optimisation of data collection and introduction of strict control mechanisms may further improve data quality.

[The DGAI CPR registry - the datasets "hospital care" and "long-term process"]. / Das DGAI-Reanimationsregister - Die Datensätze "Weiterversorgung" und "Langzeitverlauf"

After several years of preparation the German Society of Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Anästhesiologie und Intensivmedizin--DGAI) has, during its annual conference 2007, officially launched the DGAI CPR registry. After implementation of the dataset "primary care" in 2004, the datasets "definite care" and "long-term process" have now been released. The completed, internet based database is open for any interested person or institution as a tool for quality management. Data may be recorded online, and basic analyses be performed immediately. Beyond that benchmarks with other institutions are possible, by including the well accepted Utstein style on international level too.

The Effect of Ambulance Response Time on Survival Following Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest.

BACKGROUND: Out of hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) is one of the more common causes of death in Germany. Ambulance response time is an important planning parameter for emergency medical services (EMS) systems. We studied the effect of ambulance response time on survival after resuscitation from OHCA. METHODS: We analyzed data from the German Resuscitation Registry for the years 2010-2016. First, we used a multivariate logistic regression analysis to determine the effect of ambulance response time (defined as the interval from the alarm to the arrival of the first rescue vehicle) on the hospital-discharge rate (in percent), depending on various factors, including resuscitation by bystanders. Second, we compared faster and slower EMS systems (defined as those arriving on the scene within 8 minutes in more than 75% of cases or in ≤ 75% of cases) with respect to the frequency of resuscitation and the number of surviving patients. RESULTS: Our analysis of data from a total of 10 853 patients in the logistical regression model revealed that the rate of hospital discharge was significantly affected by the ambulance response time, bystander resuscitation, past medical history, age, witnessed vs. unwitnessed collapse, the initial heart rhythm, and the site of the collapse. The success of resuscitation was inversely related to the ambulance response time; thus, among patients who did not receive bystander resuscitation, the discharge rate declined from 12.9% at a mean response time of 1 minute and 10 seconds to 6.4% at a mean response time of 9 minutes and 47 seconds. Twelve faster EMS systems and 13 slower ones were identified, with a total of 9669 and 7865 resuscitated patients, respectively. The faster EMS systems initiated resuscitation more frequently and also had a higher discharge rate with good neurological outcome in proportion to the population of the catchment area (7.7 versus 5.6 persons per 100 000 population per year, odds ratio [OR] 0.72, 95% confidence interval [0.66; 0.79], p<0.001). CONCLUSION: Rapid ambulance response is associated with a higher rate of survival from OHCA with good neurological outcome. The response time, independently of whether bystander resuscitation measures are provided, ha^ a significant independent effect on the survival rate. In drawing conclusions from these findings, one should bear in mind that this was a retrospective registry study, with the corresponding limitations.