Why should we switch chest compression providers every 2 minutes during cardiopulmonary resuscitation?

Objective. This study was conducted to determine whether trained male rescuers could maintain adequate chest compres-sion depth (CCD) for longer than the cur-rent recommended guidelines of 2 minutes. Methods. Forty male medical doctors ad-ministered a 5-minute single rescuer car-diopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) to a manikin on the floor with conventional CPR or randomly administered continu-ous chest compressions (CCC). The ratio of compression to ventilation was set to 30:2 with mouth-to-mouth technique dur-ing conventional CPR. Chest compression data were recorded with an accelerometer device and divided into 1-minute segments for analysis.

Results. Although average CCD main-tained the recommended depths through-out 5 minutes in conventional CPR, it de-creased significantly with CCC (1 minute: 55.4 ± 4.5 mm; 2 minutes: 54.2 ± 5.4 mm; 3 minutes: 52.6 ± 5.6 mm; 4 minutes: 51.6 ± 5.5 mm; 5 minutes: 49.9 ± 5.8 mm, p < 0.001). The average chest compression numbers (ACCN) per minute were main-tained over 80/min and have not been changed significantly within 5 minutes in the CCC. However, it didn’t reach to the 80/min and decreased significantly after 3minutes compared to the baseline ACCN during first 1-minute segment in the con-ventional CPR.

Conclusions. Despite the chest compres-sion providers being limited to trained male medical doctors, the average CCD decreased significantly within 5minutes with CCC. Although maintaining adequate CCD, ACCN in each minute decreased sig-nificantly after 3minutes in the conventional CPR. Therefore, we should rotate chest compression providers every 2minutes re-gardless of the rescuer’s qualifications and CPR methods.

cardiopulmonary resuscitation, mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, cardiac ar-rest, healthcare provider

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