Sudden cardiac arrest accompanied by severe accidental hypothermia - modifications of the standard cardiopulmonary resuscitation procedure

Czyż Rafał, Leśkiewicz Marcin, Czyż Izabela. Sudden cardiac arrest accompanied by severe accidental hypothermia - modifications of the standard cardiopulmonary resuscitation procedure. Journal of Education, Health and Sport. 2018;8(9):1240-1250 eISNN 2391-8306. DOI http://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1430071

http://ojs.ukw.edu.pl/index.php/johs/article/view/6051

https://pbn.nauka.gov.pl/sedno-webapp/works/878517

The journal has had 7 points in Ministry of Science and Higher Education parametric evaluation. Part b item 1223 (26/01/2017).

1223 Journal of Education, Health and Sport eissn 2391-8306 7

© The Authors 2018;

This article is published with open access at Licensee Open Journal Systems of Kazimierz Wielki University in Bydgoszcz, Poland

Open Access. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial License which permits any noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author (s) and source are credited. This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non commercial license Share alike.

(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) which permits unrestricted, non commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited.

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interests regarding the publication of this paper.

Received: 02.08.2018. Revised: 18.08.2018. Accepted: 21.09.2018.

Sudden cardiac arrest accompanied by severe accidental hypothermia - modifications of the standard cardiopulmonary resuscitation procedure

Rafał Czyż¹, Marcin Leśkiewicz², Izabela Czyż³

¹Department of Emergency Medicine, Wroclaw Medical University

²Department of Emergency Medical Services, Wroclaw Medical University

³Graduate of Wroclaw Medical University

Rafał Czyż: http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5504-4543

Marcin Leśkiewicz: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0167-1618

Izabela Czyż: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7838-1670

Address for correspondence:

Rafał Czyż, Department of Emergency Medicine Wroclaw Medical University, Wroclaw. Poland; e-mail: rafalczyz1990@o2.pl

Abstract

            Severe accidental hypothermia is associated with a high mortality rate. This is related to the fact that assessment and treatment may be difficult: the severity of determining the presence of pulse and breathing, the significant sensitivity of the patient to a change in body position, difficulty in the instrumental protection of airways, ease of ventricular fibrillation occurrence and many other risks. A well-prepared medical team, coordinated actions based on current medical guidelines and recommendations, give a chance to save patients even after a few hours of cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Despite the availability of advanced devices for heating and supporting cardiovascular function in patients with cardiac arrest with coexisting hypothermia, basic activities such as isolation and protection against heat loss are critical important rescue tasks necessary for effective treatment of the patient.

            In connection with the above, this article summarizes current information about sudden cardiac arrest with coexisting hypothermia. The following aspects were discussed: definition, epidemiology, diagnosis and assessment of hypothermia severity and modifications of standard resuscitation algorithm in the case of coexisting hypothermia.

Key words: accidental hypothermia, body temperature, core temperature, rewarming, cardiopulmonary resuscitation, CPR in special circumstances