UCSD Medical Center cardiology and neurology specialists are using a novel method to save the lives of patients in cardiac arrest.
Using an innovative technology that rapidly cools the blood, the body temperature of the cardiac arrest patient is lowered, protecting the brain from damage that can result immediately after a heart attack.
Adopted at UCSD Medical Center in October 2006, the technique has been used to save multiple lives and is being implemented at hospitals worldwide.
The 24-hours following cardiac arrest represent a vulnerable period in which the body releases damaging enzymes. By cooling the body, the risk of brain damage is reduced. In February 2002, The New England Journal of Medicine reported that therapeutic mild hypothermia increased the rate of a favorable neurological outcome and reduced mortality in patients who have been successfully resuscitated after cardiac arrest caused by ventricular fibrillation.
UCSD Medical Center was the first hospital in San Diego to offer this technology, which basically changes blood temperature by circulating either cold or warm saline solution through the catheter. The cooling technology was developed by InnerCool Therapies, which was founded by John Doback, M.D., a graduate of the UCSD School of Medicine.
?While on a respirator, the body is cooled to 33 degrees Celsius, a temperature that offers critical protection of the brain during the crucial hours after a heart attack. After 24 hours, the patient is slowly warmed and revived. Initial results have been excellent,? said Ori Ben-Yehuda, M.D., Director of Coronary Care Unit, UCSD Medical Center and Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine at UC San Diego School of Medicine. ?This protocol is key to improving the survival rate of cardiac patients and to protecting the quality of life after recovery.?
According to the American Heart Association, cardiac arrest carries a greater than 90% mortality rate leading to over 300,000 deaths in the United States each year. About two thirds of unexpected cardiac deaths occur without prior recognition of cardiac disease.