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Guidelines for treating cardiac patients have usually called for giving them CPR first, then using defibrillators to apply electric shocks to finish resuscitating them. However, evidence is increasingly showing that practice is not optimal, according to Jill Ley, a clinical nurse specialist at the University of California at San Francisco Pacific Medical Center.
Speaking at an early morning session at the AORN Surgical Conference in Nashville earlier this week, Ley says that the Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS) has recommended modified procedures for treating cardiac arrest patients that differ from those from other medical bodies, such as the Adult Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) spell out.
The STS now recommends that patients first receive defibrillation via three successive shocks, then receive CPR. That is the opposite of traditional resuscitation practices that call for applying CPR first, then a single shock with a defibrillator.
The impetus for the new recommended practice, according to Ley, is several independent studies that found that patient survival rates improved when defibrillation takes place first. Ley also notes that the successive shocks are crucial...