Extracorporeal cardiopulmonary resuscitation for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest: A review of the Japanese literature

Aim

Although favourable outcomes in patients receiving extracorporeal cardiopulmonary resuscitation (ECPR) for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest have been frequently reported in Japanese journals since the late 1980s, there has been no meta-analysis of ECPR in Japan. This study reviewed and analysed all previous studies in Japan to clarify the survival rate of patients receiving ECPR.

Material and methods

Case reports, case series and abstracts of scientific meetings of ECPR for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest written in Japanese between 1983 and 2008 were collected. The characteristics and outcomes of patients were investigated, and the influence of publication bias of the case-series studies was examined by the funnel-plot method.

Results

There were 1282 out-of-hospital cardiac arrest patients, who received ECPR in 105 reports during the period. The survival rate at discharge given for 516 cases was 26.7 ± 1.4%. The funnel plot presented the relationship between the number of cases of each report and the survival rate at discharge as the reverse-funnel type that centred on the average survival rate. In-depth review of 139 cases found that the rates of good recovery, mild disability, severe disability, vegetative state, death at hospital discharge and non-recorded in all cases were 48.2%, 2.9%, 2.2%, 2.9%, 37.4% and 6.4%, respectively.

Conclusions

Based on the results of previous reports with low publication bias in Japan, ECPR appears to provide a higher survival rate with excellent neurological outcome in patients with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest.