title: Epidemiology and outcomes from non-traumatic out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in Korea: A nationwide observational study.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  We aimed to describe the epidemiological features and to determine the predictors for survival to discharge of non-traumatic out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) in Korea.
  
  
  METHODS
  A nationwide Utstein style OHCA database (2006-2007) was constructed from ambulance records and hospital medical record review. Cases were enrolled when they were non-traumatic OHCA with presumed cardiac aetiology. Using the population census (2005), we calculated age-gender standardized incidence rates (SIR) and mortality (SMR). We modelled a multivariate logistic regression analysis to determine the effect of risk factors on hospital outcomes.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The total number of EMS-assessed non-traumatic OHCA patients was 19045. The SIR was 20.9 (2006) and 22.2 (2007) per 100000 and survival-to-discharge rate was 2.3% for EMS-assessed non-traumatic OHCA, and was 3.5% for the resuscitation-attempted group. From a multivariate logistic regression analysis, witnessed arrest, and shorter basic life support (BLS) and EMS intervals turned out to be significant predictors of good outcome in the resuscitation-attempted group.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  From a nationwide OHCA cohort, the incidence of EMS-assessed non-traumatic OHCA was found to be low. Survival-to-discharge rate in the resuscitation-attempted group was 3.5%, which was significantly associated with witnessed arrest, and shorter BLS and EMS intervals.
authors.affiliation: Center for Education and Training of EMS and Rescue, Seoul Fire Academy, Seoul, Republic of Korea. arendt75@gmail.com
authors.forename: Ki Ok
authors.initials: KO
authors.lastname: Ahn
authors.forename: Sang Do
authors.initials: SD
authors.lastname: Shin
authors.forename: Gil Joon
authors.initials: GJ
authors.lastname: Suh
authors.forename: Won Chul
authors.initials: WC
authors.lastname: Cha
authors.forename: Kyoung Jun
authors.initials: KJ
authors.lastname: Song
authors.forename: Soo Jin
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.forename: Eui Jung
authors.initials: EJ
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: Marcus Eng Hock
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Ong
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D016887:Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation / Q000379:methods* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004632:Emergency Medical Services / Q000379:methods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006323:Heart Arrest / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000628:therapy; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007723:Korea / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011159:Population Surveillance / Q000379:methods*; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D015996:Survival Rate / Q000639:trends; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D055815:Young Adult