Abstract 9560: Identifying Best Practices for Education and Training of Resuscitation Teams for In-Hospital Cardiac Arrest

Abstract

Background: In-hospital cardiac arrest (IHCA) leads to poor survival. Research suggests provider skills may play a role, but little is known on how education and training differ across hospitals. Methods: We conducted a qualitative analysis of semi-structured interview data obtained from 9 diverse hospitals from the AHA Get With The Guidelines registry, selected based on IHCA survival performance (5 top, 1 middle, 3 bottom). Thematic analysis was used to identify best practices related to training and education of resuscitation teams. Results: In total, 129 interviews were conducted with hospital staff including nurses, respiratory therapists, physicians, pharmacists, and other staff yielding 78 hours of interview time. Four themes related to training and education were identified: engagement, clear communication, consistency, and leadership listening. Top hospitals encouraged employee engagement with branding and prioritizing hands-on learning over passive didactics. Clear communication was accomplished with debriefing, structured institutional review, and continual, frequent department education. Consistency was a cornerstone to culture change and achieved with uniform policies for simulation practice as well as routine practice (weekly, monthly, quarterly). Finally, sites excelling in IHCA survival had responsive leadership who listened and adapted programs to fit staff needs. A striking characteristic was also multidisciplinary leadership participation. Conclusions: Among top hospitals, we identified core elements for successful training of resuscitation teams. Developing tools to address these areas may help improve IHCA outcomes.