AHA, Laerdal Medical Launch Resuscitation Academy for EMS

A suite of resuscitation quality improvement programs for pre-hospital and public safety responders is now available from RQI Partners LLC, the joint venture partnership between the American Heart Association and Laerdal Medical, to help improve cardiac arrest survival rates in communities nationwide. The programs are created by the American Heart Association, Laerdal Medical and the Resuscitation Academy Foundation—three organizations that created the Resuscitation Academy Collaborative in 2016 to identify and provide best practices to reverse the public health crisis of dismal cardiac arrest outcomes.

According to the American Heart Association, a voluntary health organization devoted to a world of longer, healthier lives, more than 350,000 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests occur in the U.S. annually. About 90% of people who suffer out-of-hospital cardiac arrest die. Out-of-hospital cardiac arrest is a time-critical, life-threatening condition that requires peak, high-quality performance by pre-hospital and public safety responders. The four programs are designed to strengthen the chain of survival from individual and team responder education to evaluation of overall system effectiveness.

Built on the foundation of the Resuscitation Academy’s expertise and success in increasing out-of-hospital cardiac arrest survival in Seattle and the proven Resuscitation Quality Improvement® (RQI®) methodology of verified CPR competency and mastery learning, which was co-developed by the American Heart Association and Laerdal Medical, the programs include:

• RQI Telecommunicator (RQI-T), a blended educational and resuscitation quality improvement program that provides continuous, simulation-based mastery learning, practice and analytics to telecommunicators for delivery of high-quality telephone CPR to bystanders.

• RQI EMS, a blended learning program for emergency medical service (EMS) providers that promotes mastery of high-quality CPR through short, frequent skills sessions.

• RQI EMS Team, a high-performance CPR quality improvement program developed for individuals who respond to medical emergencies as a team.

• Cardiac Arrest System Assessment, to engage EMS systems on how to improve survival rates from out-of-hospital cardiac arrest.

“Research shows that continuous resuscitation training can lead to a significant increase in out-of-hospital cardiac arrest survival rates,” said Clive Patrickson, RQI Partners’ chief executive officer. “We’re pleased to work with the Resuscitation Academy in providing quality improvement solutions to pre-hospital and public safety responders and offering an EMS system assessment—affording a comprehensive product portfolio to impact the chain of survival.”

The statistics on out-of-hospital cardiac arrest occurrences and survival bring urgency to optimizing every link in the chain of survival:

• The median survival rate for cardiac arrest nationwide is 11% for all rhythms. CPR, especially if performed immediately, can double or triple a cardiac arrest victim’s chance of survival.

• About 46% of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest victims get CPR from a bystander.

• For every minute that lifesaving measures such as CPR are delayed, a victim’s chance of survival declines by 7 – 10%.

• Research shows that skills and the ability to recognize and manage a cardiac arrest event decay in one to six months, which may result in a delay, or failure, to initiate telephone CPR.

​For additional information and to learn more about these programs, visit the RQI Partners’ website.