European Resuscitation Council and European Society of Intensive Care Medicine 2015 guidelines for post-resuscitation care

Abstract

The European Resuscitation Council and the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine have collaborated to produce these post-resuscitation care guidelines, which are based on the 2015 International Consensus on Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation Science with Treatment Recommendations. Recent changes in post-resuscitation care include: (a) greater emphasis on the need for urgent coronary catheterisation and percutaneous coronary intervention following out-of-hospital cardiac arrest of likely cardiac cause; (b) targeted temperature management remains important but there is now an option to target a temperature of 36 °C instead of the previously recommended 32–34 °C; (c) prognostication is now undertaken using a multimodal strategy and there is emphasis on allowing sufficient time for neurological recovery and to enable sedatives to be cleared; (d) increased emphasis on rehabilitation after survival from a cardiac arrest.