Warren County Emergency Medical Services has joined a Duke University study that seeks to increase the cardiac arrest survival rate here and across the state.
The RAndomized Cluster Evaluation of Cardiac ARrest Systems Study, or RACE CARS Trial, over the next seven years has a goal of improving cardiac saves across the whole emergency response system, explained Captain Chris Tucker, interim WCEMS division chief and county coordinator for the Duke program.
“Should where you live determine whether you live?” Tucker said. “In a rural setting, that’s what we want to change.”
Giving cardiac arrest victims—who have an 11 percent survival rate in Warren County, not an unusual statistic in a rural area—the best chance at making it means equipping as many people as possible with the knowledge and tools to help, even the very youngest.