Cardiopulmonary arrest occurs in approximately 290 000 hospitalized patients annually in the United States, representing nearly 1% of all admissions and with survival estimated at 20%. To date, most research on cardiopulmonary arrest has focused on patients who experience cardiac arrest in the out-of-hospital setting with results extrapolated to those with cardiac arrest in hospitals. However, there are distinct differences in the treatment of patients who experience cardiac arrest in the hospital setting where disease processes, etiologies, and illness severity differ and medical response time is often shorter.
Source: JAMA Online First