A journey with mechanical chest compression

The two authors of this article have been leading the UK arm of the LUCAS in Cardiac Arrest (LINC) study for the last five years, and have both been studying mechanical chest compression research and its use in clinical pre-hospital practice for the last 11 years.

This paper outlines some of their experience with automated resuscitation, and covers some of the theoretical concepts of modern resuscitation practice.

The authors begin with an introduction to their part in an international randomised controlled trial, which was designed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of mechanical chest compressions using LUCAS^TM (Physio-Control Sweden/Jolife AB, Lund, Sweden) in association with defibrillation during ongoing CPR without delay, as compared to manual cardiopulmonary resuscitation in out of hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA).

The findings of the LINC study were presented in September 2013 (Rubertsson et al, 2013).

‘It seems a lifetime ago that we first met the LUCAS device.’ It was in 2002, David Halliwell (DH) was in Florence, Italy, at the European Resuscitation Council conference when he first noticed the LUCAS device being promoted by a small Scandinavian company Jolife AB, Lund, Sweden.