Hypothermia in Cardiac Arrest: A Meta-Analysis and Evidence-Based Appraisal of the Current Data

Abstract

Cooling the human body, particularly the brain, has been of concern for a long time. The resuscitation guideline by the American Heart Association that was released in 2010 declared therapeutic hypothermia, defined as maintaining the body temperature between 32°C and 34°C for 12–24 h, as a Class I intervention in cardiac arrest patients secondary to ventricular fibrillation. However, the targeted temperature management (TTM) trial released after the aforementioned guideline has contrary results compared with the previous one. This evidence-based article aimed to appraise the current literature and perform a meta-analysis.

Keywords

• Therapeutic hypothermia
• cardiac arrest