Factors associated with post-arrest withdrawal of life-sustaining therapy.

ABSTRACT:

Introduction

Most successfully resuscitated cardiac arrest patients do not survive to hospital discharge. Many have withdrawal of life sustaining therapy (WLST) as a result of the perception of poor neurologic prognosis. The characteristics of these patients and differences in their post-arrest care are largely unknown.

Methods

Utilizing the Penn Alliance for Therapeutic Hypothermia Registry, we identified a cohort of 1311 post-arrest patients from 26 hospitals from 2010 to 2014 who remained comatose after return of spontaneous circulation. We stratified patients by whether they had WLST post-arrest and analyzed demographic, arrest, and post-arrest variables.

Results

In our cohort, 565 (43%) patients had WLST. In multivariate regression, patients who had WLST were les

SUBMITTER: Grossestreuer AV 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5541857 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature