Chapter 13 Post resuscitation care

Question 1

How might post-cardiac arrest brain injury manifest itself?

Answer 1

Coma
Seizures
Myoclonus
Other neurocognitive dysfunction
Brain death

Question 2

Are chest pain and ST elevation good predictors of acute coronary occlusion post CPR?

Answer 2

No but PCI should be arrange to evaluate for this

Question 3

Do all patients need to stay intubated once ROSC is achieved?

Answer 3

No, depending on situation, if patient is waking, gagging, you can consider immediate extubation
If not, sedate as gagging on ETT causes catecholamine surge and risk of arrhythmias

Question 4

Once you have ROSC, the patient can be thought of has have a
cardiac cause or
non-cardiac

What are the investigations for each group of patient?

Answer 4

Cardiac: if STE needs angiography. If no STE, still consider angiography
Non-cardiac: If cause is not immediately known (e.g drug overdose) order CT brain and CTPA