Situational Analysis

In 2014, we began a comprehensive Cardiac Arrest Resuscitation program called “Race to the Top”. The project began in in late 2014, with eight specific, measurable, and actionable objectives:

Immediate recognition of sudden cardiac arrest;
911 activation, “First-Care” hands-only CPR, GPS to the rescue (PulsePoint);
Access to and utilization of AEDs;
Pit crew resuscitation by EMS providers;
Deployment of Advanced Practice Paramedics;
Advanced biomedical tools;
Immediate provider feedback; and
Community and caregiver recognition.

AMT began the program with a Return of Spontaneous Circulation rate of 27%, and have now reached 45%, well on the way to their near-60% goal. The national average is just 9%.

In December 2014, AMT became the first downstate Illinois EMS agency to report directly to the Cardiac Arrest Registry to Enhance Survival (CARES), a CDC-approved registry provided by Emory University. CARES participation empowers the AMT team to compare Race to the Top’s results with peer cities in North America. This benchmarking is in and of itself another best practice, and helps to drive ever-better results.

AMT’s key objective was to achieve widespread cultural expectations and awareness that saving lives is a community responsibility. “Saving lives is everyone’s responsibility,” says AMT CEO, Andrew Rand, “by working together we can achieve even better results.”

Goals

The goal of this project is to increase the survivability of out-of-hospital Cardiac Arrest patients, and increase the likelihood of a discharge to home with a positive neurological outcome.

Planning & Implementation

The Resuscitation Academy is a logical offshoot of our successful “Race to the Top” program. Lauren Emanuelson manages our “Race to the Top” program, focused on cardiac arrest resuscitation.
Using the data pulled from bystander AEDs, X-Series monitors, and Zoll ePCR platforms, she has fine-tuned our Resuscitation Academies, which are open to all area First Responders.
After implementing the ResQ Pump, in addition to the ResQ Pods already in place, our cardiac arrest resuscitation numbers are among the best in the nation. (comprehensive data provided in the presentation uploaded with this entry)

Results

The Resuscitation Academy project has exceeded our expectations and the results were expressed as the number of cardiac arrest patients who were resuscitated and then discharged with a positive neurological outcome.

Impact

In 2018, we achieved our best cardiac arrest resuscitation rates in our history, and among the best in the entire nation. Our survival rate of Utstein bystander cardiac arrests was 87.5%.
The results are achieved by using data to drive evidence-based revisions to our protocols for the management of cardiac arrest.

Budget

The budget of $40,000 allows for donations of equipment, including ZOLL ResQPump and Impedance Threshold Devices. These devices are granted to first responder agencies to which we most often interface. Training is usually done using salaried Operations Managers, with oversight from Lauren Emanuelson.

Files: 36246673 1333846096748405 7302628117661614080 n.jpg, 36268037 1333846060081742 1238386698052698112 n.jpg, 57426296 2422849494405821 2228186104966676480 n.jpg, AMT press release CPR.pdf, Final draft Hospital Engagement RTTT Strategy presentation.pptx