CardioExchange Archive

There’s more evidence to encourage widespread adoption of chest compression-only CPR by nonmedical responders. Bentley Bobrow and colleagues analyzed data from 4415 adults with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest who did not receive CPR from a medical professional. After adjusting for baseline differences, the survival rate did not differ between people who received conventional CPR from lay rescuers and those who received no CPR at all. By contrast, people who received lay-rescue compression-only CPR had a significantly better chance of survival compared with those who received no CPR and those who received conventional CPR. In addition, in their report in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the investigators report that from 2005 to 2009, lay-rescue CPR increased significantly over time, and that the proportion of CPR that utilized compression-only CPR increased from 20% to 76%. Overall survival rose from 3.7% in 2005 to 9.8% in 2009.

In an accompanying editorial, David Cone notes that standard CPR and compression-only CPR are considered equivalent by the AHA and that in guidelines expected later this year, compression-only CPR will likely “continue to be deemed at least equivalent to standard CPR, if not superior, for nonmedical bystanders.”