Cardiac arrest & resuscitation
Swedish emergency medical dispatch centres’ ability to answer emergency medical calls and dispatch an ambulance in response to out-of-hospital cardiac arrest calls in accordance with the American Heart Association performance goals: An observational study
Authors' conclusion
The majority of calls were answered within the AHA performance goals. When an ambulance was dispatched within the AHA high-performance standard in response to OHCA calls, survival was higher compared with calls when dispatch was delayed.
Study context
- Population
- Medical emergency calls and out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) calls to Swedish Emergency Medical Dispatch Centres (EMDCs) over 10 years (1-step and 2-step procedures)medical calls answered (1-step)
- Participants
- 9,174,940 participants
- Exposure
- Ambulance dispatch within 70 s vs >100 s for OHCA calls
- Outcome
- Answer and ambulance dispatch delays vs AHA performance goals; association of delays with 30-day survival
Methodological detailsnationwide registry, Data from the Swedish Registry for Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation and EMDC
- Nationwide registry
- Data from the Swedish Registry for Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation and EMDC
Main finding
As reported in the abstract
Median answer delay, all medical calls (1-step), s (IQR 3.6-14.5)
7.3
Median answer delay, 2-step calls (594,008; 6.1%), s (IQR 30-53)
39
Median answer delay, OHCA (45,367; 0.5%), s (IQR 3.6-14.1); American Heart Association (AHA) high-performance goal 10 s
7.2
Median ambulance dispatch delay, OHCA, s (IQR 81.7-159.9)
111.9
Observational data: associations, not effects.
Further findings
30-day survival after OHCA by dispatch delay (1-step)
P = 0.0013
30-day survival after OHCA by dispatch delay (1-step)
- No difference in 30-day survival by answer delay (1-step)
- Outcome data for 2-step procedure unobtainable
Original publication
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