The results of EuReCa ONE highlight that OHCA is still a major public health problem accounting for a substantial number of deaths in Europe. EuReCa ONE very clearly demonstrates marked differences in the processes for data collection and reported outcomes following OHCA all over Europe. Using these data and analyses, different countries, regions, systems, and concepts can benchmark themselves and may learn from each other to further improve survival following one of our major health care events.
Aims
The influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on attendance to out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) has only been described in city or regional settings. The impact of COVID-19 across an entire country with a high infection rate is yet to be explored.
Methods
The study uses data from 8629 cases recorded in two time-series (2017/2018 and 2020) of the Spanish national registry. Data from a non-COVID-19 period and the COVID-19 period (February 1st–April 30th 2020) were compared. During the COVID-19 period, data a further analysis comparing non-pandemic and pandemic weeks (defined according to the WHO declaration on March 11th, 2020) was conducted. The chi-squared analysis examined differences in OHCA attendance and other patient and resuscitation characteristics. Multivariate logistic regression examined survival likelihood to hospital admission and discharge. The multilevel analysis examined the differential effects of regional COVID-19 incidence on these same outcomes.
Results
During the COVID-19 period, the incidence of resuscitation attempts declined and survival to hospital admission (OR = 1.72; 95%CI = 1.46–2.04; p < 0.001) and discharge (OR = 1.38; 95%CI = 1.07–1.78; p = 0.013) fell compared to the non-COVID period. This pattern was also observed when comparing non-pandemic weeks and pandemic weeks. COVID-19 incidence impinged significantly upon outcomes regardless of regional variation, with low, medium, and high incidence regions equally affected.
Conclusions
The pandemic, irrespective of its incidence, seems to have particularly impeded the pre-hospital phase of OHCA care. Present findings call for the need to adapt out-of-hospital care for periods of serious infection risk.
Study registration number
ISRCTN10437835.
Many potential donors are missed in current clinical practice. uDCD programs are few and underused even in a country with high rates of organ transplantation.
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