Smartest Doc
Prehospital Epinephrine for Cardiac Arrest Linked to Higher Mortality Full Text
Emergency Medicine News, 07/06/2012
Scheck A – A mere month after cardiac arrest, patients given epinephrine as part of their prehospital care show a higher risk of mortality and a lower likelihood of good outcome, a finding that has stunned emergency physicians in the very place the study was conducted.
Methods- The author evaluated a cohort of more than 417,000 patients to compare epinephrine use with non–use in out–of–hospital cardiac arrest.
- Because epinephrine is so strongly correlated with circulatory resumption, physicians at Kyushu University's emergency and critical care center postulated that the drug may save the heart but not necessarily the brain.
- The guidelines now recommend administration of about 1 mg of epinephrine every three to five minutes during cardiac arrest.
- Perhaps this is not the correct dose, or perhaps for some patients this dose is correct, whereas for other patients this dose is harmful.
