Continuous Chest Compressions vs. 30:2. Does It Matter? Depends On the Quality!

Seattle Fire Department Engine 2. The rescuer on the left has just placed a metronome on the ground. I will eventually get around to composing a more thoughtful blog post about my experiences at the Resuscitation Academy but in the interim I wanted to share something about the ventilation strategy in King County, Washington. There isn’t much controversy in the fact that ventilations are probably unnecessary in the first 4 minutes of sudden cardiac arrest. The idea is that the arterial system is full of fresh, oxygenated blood at the time of collapse. However, after that time period has elapsed things get a bit murky and this is where there are differences of opinion. Instrumented manikin at the Resuscitation Academy. There is a high rate of bystander CPR in King County (about 1/2 the time dispatcher-directed) so bystanders are performing continuous chest compressions for 4-6 minutes prior to the arrival of EMS. I think we can all agree this is a good thing. However, you can also argue (and Peter Kudenchuk, M.D. does) that ventilations are not so easily omitted when 4-6 minutes of continuous chest compressions have already taken place. Once EMS arrives at the scene, expertly performed chest compressions (rate, depth, and recoil) are initiated. They train with instrumented manikins in King County, and one thing we discovered is that every single one of us “leaned”. The smallest amount of leaning on the chest destroys recoil, preventing the negative pressure g...
Source: EMS 12-Lead - Category: Cardiology Authors: Tags: Cardiac Arrest Resuscitation Academy Source Type: research