Impact of Pit-Crew Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation on Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest in Saskatoon

Background In the prehospital setting, pit-crew models of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) have shown improvements in survival after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA). Certain districts in North America have adopted this model, including Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. Objectives Our objectives were to determine whether pit-crew CPR has an impact on survival to discharge after OHCA in Saskatoon, Canada. Methods This was a retrospective pre- and postintervention study. All adult patients who had an OHCA between January 1, 2011 and December 31, 2017 of presumed cardiac origin, in which the resuscitation attempt included CPR by trained prehospital responders, were considered for analysis. Our primary outcome was survival to discharge. Survival to admission and return of spontaneous circulation were secondary outcomes. Results There were 860 OHCAs considered for our study. After 46 exclusions there were 442 in the non–pit-crew group (average age 63.7 years; 64.5% male) and 372 in the pit-crew group (average age 63.5 years; 67.5% male). Survival to discharge after an OHCA was 10.4% (95% confidence interval 7.7–13.6%) in the non–pit-crew group and 12.4% (95% CI 9.2–16.2%) in the pit-crew group, which did not meet statistical significance. Return of spontaneous circulation and survival to admission were 48.4% and 31.3%, respectively, in the non–pit-crew group and 46.7% and 32.3%, respectively, in the pit-crew group. Conclusions In our study, implementation of a pit-crew CPR model was not associated with an improvement in survival to discharge after OHCA.