Application of cardiac surgery techniques to improve the results of cardiopulmonary resuscitation after cardiac arrest: Controlled automated reperfusion of the whole body

Until now, the overall results (survival and neurologic outcome) of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) after cardiac arrest (CA) have been quite dismal. They have improved when compared with the outcome over the past number of decades but are still far from ideal. This is true for both out-of-hospital cardiac arrest1,2 and in-hospital cardiac arrest.3 Survival after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest is reported to be in the range of 8% to 10%2 with neurologic damage found in many of the survivors.