Greater Sydney Area HEMS

The Paramedic experience of managing patients included in the EVIDENCE Trial.

This post was written by Dr Shannon Townsend, HEMS registrar.

The ACE Training Centre recently hosted the 2022 NSW Ambulance Out-Of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest Symposium, with the theme of the day focusing on excellence at every step.

Of the many presentations of note was that by Intensive Care Paramedic, Harry Reeves, who presented ‘Real life experience in OHCA expedited versus standard management’. Harry, who is based at the Blacktown Super Station provided an insight into the paramedic experience of managing patients included in the EVIDENCE Trial and gave invaluable advice on how best to facilitate the timely delivery of these patients to the ED.

OHCA is the leading cause of sudden death in adults and the EVIDENCE Trial tests the efficacy, replicability and value of an expedited bundle of care for OHCA including expedited transfer from scene, mechanical CPR (MCPR), ECMO during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (ECPR) with subsequent immediate coronary angiography in carefully selected patients. This bundle of care has produced excellent results and more data is needed on efficacy, scalability and cost of MCPR and ECPR versus standard care.

This presentation focuses on flipping the cognitive switch in moving from a long-taught and rigorously rehearsed standard model of care for OHCA to expedited transfer whilst still paying attention to detail and facilitating success. Lessons such as “be quick – but don’t hurry”, “optimise your bandwidth” and “rule the resus room” are imparted with applicability not only to the EVIDENCE Trial, but also our daily practice. 

In the following video, Harry talks about his experiences with the EVIDENCE trial.