Cardiac arrest & resuscitation
Long-term functional and quality of life outcomes for survivors of asystolic out-of-hospital cardiac arrest
Authors' conclusion
Among 12-month survivors of EMS-treated asystolic OHCA, good functional recovery was achieved by only one-third of patients, with most survivors experiencing persistent disability and impaired HRQoL.
Study context
- Population
- Adults with emergency medical services (EMS)-treated asystolic out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) (excluding EMS-witnessed arrests), Victorian Ambulance Cardiac Arrest Registry, 2010–202456 completed follow-up
- Participants
- 16,803 adults
- Outcome
- Functional (GOS-E) and health-related quality-of-life (HRQoL) (EQ-5D, SF-12) outcomes, living arrangements and employment status
- Follow-up
- 12 months
Methodological detailsregistry-based, structured telephone interviews
- Registry-based
- Structured telephone interviews
Main finding
As reported in the abstract
Functional and HRQoL outcomes among 12-month survivors
- Good functional recovery (Glasgow Outcome Scale-Extended (GOS-E) ≥7), respondents
- 18 (32.1%)
- Vegetative state or severe disability
- 28 (50.0%)
- Living at home without ongoing support
- 23 (41.1%)
- Full health on EQ-5D index
- 9 (16.1%)
- Median EQ-5D index score
- 0.7 (0.5-0.9)
- Mean visual analogue scale (VAS) declined from pre-arrest 70.1 to 58.0
- p = 0.003
Observational data: associations, not effects.
Further findings
Survival to discharge
- Discharged alive
- 83 (0.5%)
Mortality after discharge · 12 months
- 12-month mortality
- 13.3% (95% CI: 7.6-22.7%)
- Alive at 12 months
- 70 (84.3%)
- Completed follow-up
- 56 (80.0%)
Original publication
Long-term functional and quality of life outcomes for survivors of asystolic out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. Resuscitation. Published 8 June 2026. doi:10.
Composed by AI from the published abstract and checked against it. How Briefs are made →