Aim:

High-quality cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is the cornerstone to improved outcomes for patients with cardiac arrest. The aim of this prospective randomized study was to evaluate whether audio-visual feedback use affects the critical components of high-quality CPR compared with CPR without feedback.

Materials and Methods:

One hundred in-hospital Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) providers volunteered as participants. Participants were tested on a high-fidelity manikin in a simulated cardiac arrest scenario performing 2 min of single-rescuer CPR. The control group completed the scenario with conventional CPR, whereas the intervention group adjusted CPR as instructed by the Philips MRx accelerometer. The primary outcome was mean compression rate, whereas the secondary outcomes included percent appropriate compression rate, mean compression depth, percent appropriate compression depth, percent complete chest recoil, percent chest compression fraction (CCF%), mean ventilations per minute.

Results:

The intervention arm had a higher median percent of compressions with an appropriate rate (between 100 and 120 min−1, 92.5% vs. 46.0%; p<0.001) and CCF% (mean 68.9% vs. 66.9%; p=0.029). Twenty percent of the control arm had zero chest compressions within the American Heart Association-recommended compression rate range. The intervention arm also had a significantly lower mean compression rate (110.3 min−1 vs. 117.3 min−1; p=0.004). A trend toward decreased compression depth with the intervention group was found (44.2 mm vs. 47.5 mm; p=0.062).

Conclusions:

In-hospital cardiac arrest providers provided a slower but more appropriate compression rate and a higher CCF% using the Philips MRx accelerometer than providers without the device. The intervention group trended toward a decreased compression depth.