• Leif Rognås, Troels Martin Hansen, Hans Kirkegaard, and Else Tønnesen.
• Department of Research and Development, Norwegian Air Ambulance Foundation, P.O. Box 94, 1441 Drøbak, Norway; Pre-hospital Critical Care Team, Department of Anaesthesiology, Viborg Regional Hospital, Heibergs Allé 4, 8800 Viborg, Denmark; Pre-hospital Critical Care Team, Aarhus University Hospital, Oluf Palmes Allé 32, 8200 Aarhus N, Denmark; Department of Pre-hospital Medical Services, Central Denmark Region, Oluf Palmes Allé 34, 8200 Aarhus N, Denmark. Electronic address: leifrogn@rm.dk.
• Resuscitation. 2014 Mar 1;85(3):332-5.

AimThe aim of this study was to investigate if an initial ETCO2 value at or below 1.3 kPa can be used as a cut-off value for whether return of spontaneous circulation during pre-hospital cardio-pulmonary resuscitation is achievable or not.Materials And MethodsWe prospectively registered data according to the Utstein-style template for reporting data from pre-hospital advanced airway management from February 1st 2011 to October 31st 2012. Included were consecutive patients at all ages with pre-hospital cardiac arrest treated by eight anaesthesiologist-staffed pre-hospital critical care teams in the Central Denmark Region.ResultsWe registered data from 595 cardiac arrest patients; in 60.2% (n=358) of these cases the pre-hospital critical care teams performed pre-hospital advanced airway management beyond bag-mask ventilation. An initial end-tidal CO2 measurement following pre-hospital advanced airway management were available in 75.7% (n=271) of these 358 cases. We identified 22 patients, who had an initial end-tidal CO2 at or below 1.3 kPa. Four of these patients achieved return of spontaneous circulation.ConclusionOur results indicates that an initial end-tidal CO2 at or below 1.3 kPa during pre-hospital CPR should not be used as a cut-off value for the achievability of return of spontaneous circulation.Copyright © 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd.. All rights reserved.

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