Cardiac arrests in unmonitored wards: 3 years in a hospital

Methods It was performed a prospective cohort study, according to Utstein style, of every inhospital CA occurred in the universitary “Virgen de las Nieves” hospital during a period of 3 years (July 2009 to June 2012). CA in operating room, recovery and when extra-hospital resuscitation was initiated were excluded. All patients in whom resuscitation was not performed or in which it was suspended, because of the existence of an advance care plan, the existence of do not resuscitate orders or those in which resuscitation was deemed futile, were also excluded. It was also recorded the use of defibrillators (manual or automatic external defibrillator) before the arrival of the cardiopulmonary resuscitation team, regardless of whether shock was administered or not. We have analyzed and compared the arrests in monitored areas versus the rest. Results were expressed as percentages, means and medians ± standard deviation. Statistical analysis was performed using the chi test when the dependent variable (survival and shockable rhythm) was qualitative and the t-Student test when it was quantitative (interval CA-start of cardiopulmonary resuscitation).