Can bystanders'gender affect the clinical outcome of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest: A prospective, multicentre observational study

Introduction Out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) is one of the most common causes of death in many countries. For OHCA patients to have a good clinical outcome, bystander CPR is very important. It is necessary to study the various characteristics of bystanders to improve bystander CPR quality. We aimed to evaluate the correlation between bystander's gender and the clinical outcome in patients with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA). Material & Method We conducted an observational study using a prospective, multicentre registry of OHCA resuscitation, provided by the Korean Cardiac Arrest Research Consortium registry from October 2015 to June 2017. Patients'age, patients'gender, witnessed by a layperson, bystanders'characteristics (age grouped by decade, gender, CPR education, compression method, and perception of AED), arrest place, EMS arrival time, and initial electrocardiogram (ECG) rhythms were collected. Outcome variables were prehospital return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC), survival discharge, and cerebral performance category (CPC) status at hospital discharge. We evaluated the association between bystanders'gender and outcomes. Result A total of 691 patients were included in this study. Characteristics such as age, patient's gender, witnessed by layperson, bystander's gender, initial shockable rhythm, and arrest place were significantly associated with neurologic outcome at discharge, using univariable analysis. However, in multivariate logistic model, there was no significant correlation between the bystande's gender and neurologic outcome. Conclusion There was a correlation between the bystander's gender and patient's neurologic outcome in the univariate logistic analysis. However, considering other influencing factors, no significant difference was found in the clinical outcome between bystanders'genders.