2024/12/31 by Celestine Weegenaar, Zane Perkins, David Lockey · 1 voice
Medicine · #Cardiac Arrest and Resuscitation #Trauma Management and Diagnosis #Trauma and Emergency Care Studies
paper · pdf · doi:10.1186/s13049-024-01304-z
openalex publication_date 2024/12/31 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
Traumatic Cardiac Arrest (TCA) precedes death in patients with traumatic injury. Although often associated with unsurvivable injuries, some cases are amenable to the correction of reversible causes. Injuries resulting in immediate TCA are only likely to be prevented by public health interventions. The causes of TCA are well documented and the pathologies that cause early death (e.g. airway obstruction, traumatic asphyxia, tension pneumothorax and cardiac tamponade) are more common in the pre-hospital population than the in-hospital population because many patients with these conditions do not survive to hospital. However, most immediate treatment interventions are the same regardless of where the patient presents. The range of interventions provided by pre-hospital services can be variable and depends on the skill set of providers on scene. This document is patient centred and necessary interventions are stated regardless of whether they can always be delivered in the pre-hospital phase of care. Some pre-hospital services may not be able to deliver all time critical interventions on scene and rapid transfer to hospital is then the only management option. Although hangings, electrocutions and drownings are often reported in studies of traumatic cardiac arrest they have different mechanisms and resuscitation considerations to traumatic cardiac arrest and are not covered in this position statement.