Journal of epidemiology
-
Journal of epidemiology · Jan 2001
Comparative StudyThe defibrillation system of basic emergency medical technicians in Japan: a comparison with other systems from a 14-year review of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest reports.
Although seven years have passed after basic emergency medical technician (EMT) defibrillation system was introduced in Japan, the overall survival for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) remains poor. We investigated factors leading to such an unanticipated result in Japan by comparing the data of OHCA in Japan with those in other countries. We obtained population-based OHCA data from three communities in Japan. ⋯ Although the incidence rate of collapse-witnessed OHCA with ventricular fibrillation (VF) was much lower in Japan than western countries, the proportions of survival from it were comparable to those. Basic-EMT defibrillation system in Japan has yielded excellent result in terms of the survival of VF cases. However, much lower proportion of VF to all cases is responsible for lower overall rates of survival from OHCA in Japan.