VIDEO: Dane County EMS is reporting double the national average success rate when returning a person who suffered cardiac arrest to quality of life.
“We respond to just over 400 sudden cardiac arrests in a given year. In Dane County, for every patient that we respond to, we have about a 15% success rate in returning that person to a quality of life. Nationally, that’s at right around 7% for the quality of life,” said EMS data analyst Eric Anderson.
Anderson says when a bystander responds with CPR, the survival rate jumps to 65%. SSM Health EMS regional medical director, Dr. Kacey Kronenfeld, says a huge part of the success is bystander CPR, getting crucial compressions started immediately while EMS is on the way. The only way this is possible is by training 911 call-takers on how to best convey CPR instructions over the phone.