Outcome of Out-of-Hospital Cardiac or Respiratory Arrest in Children

In children, the outcome of cardiac arrest outside the hospital has been poor, with very high rates of mortality and neurologic morbidity. 1 Many survivors remain in a persistent vegetative state, 1 recovery from which is unlikely. 2 Recently, much has been written on the prediction of outcome after cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in adults, 3 and distinct criteria for terminating resuscitation efforts have been developed. 4 In a large study of adults, only 0.4 percent of the patients who failed to respond to advanced cardiac life support before arrival at the hospital survived to discharge from the hospital, and all had moderate-to-severe cerebral disability. 3 Bonnin . . .