Resuscitation
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We investigated the association of health insurance status with post-resuscitation care and neurological recovery in out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) and whether the effects changed with age or gender. ⋯ There were disparities in post-resuscitation care and substantial neurological recovery by health insurance status, and the disparities were prominent in middle-aged adults and males. Increasing health insurance coverage for post-resuscitation care should be considered.
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Early EEG patterns and SSEP responses are associated with neurological recovery of comatose patients with postanoxic encephalopathy after cardiac arrest. However, the nature and distribution of brain damage underlying the characteristic EEG and SSEP patterns are unknown. We relate EEG and SSEP findings with results from histological analyses of the brains of eleven non-survivors. ⋯ Absent SSEP responses were always accompanied by thalamic damage. Pathological burst suppression patterns were associated with a variable degree of neuronal damage to cortex, cerebellum and hippocampus. In patients with additional thalamic involvement, burst-suppression with identical bursts was observed, a characteristic EEG pattern presumably reflecting residual activity from a relatively isolated and severely compromised cortex.