A Novel Patient Decision Aid for Surrogate Decision Makers of Comatose Survivors of Cardiac Arrest

University of Colorado Denver (CU Denver)

Status: Completed

Conditions: Cardiac Arrest With Successful Resuscitation

Treatments: Other: Decision Aid for Surrogate Decision Makers of Comatose Survivors of Cardiac Arrest

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; NIH

Identifiers

NCT03908346

EMF20_MCRD_00007 (Other Grant/Funding Number)

K23HL138164 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

19-0795

Details and patient eligibility

About

This study will test the feasibility and acceptability of deploying a decision aid for surrogate decision makers of comatose survivors of cardiac arrest early during hospitalization. This decision aid is to inform, educate and support decision makers charged with determining goals of care during post-cardiac arrest treatment.

Full description

Survival and neurological recovery after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest are highly variable, driven in part by inconsistent hospital care following successful resuscitation. International guidelines for post-cardiac arrest care recommend delaying neurologic prognostication until 72-hours after resuscitation because early prognostication is imprecise and may precipitate inappropriate withdrawal of life sustaining therapy (WLST). Early WLST has been observed in-post cardiac arrest care. In order to encourage better guideline concordant care, the study proposes the implementation of an educational tool to support and inform surrogate decision makers in post-cardiac arrest care and neuro-prognostication. This pilot study will test the feasibility of implementing an educational tool for surrogate decision makers, the acceptability of such an intervention and early measures of knowledge translation. This study will inform the creation of a randomized controlled trial to test the ability of the tool to encourage guideline concordant timing of post-cardiac arrest neuro-prognostication.

Enrollment: 41 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 89 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Adult 18 years of age and older
• Identified as a surrogate decision maker for patient who is a comatose survivor of out of hospital cardiac arrest

Exclusion criteria

• Illiterate or poor proficiency (unable to read decision aid)
• Non-english speaking

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: N/A

Interventional model: Single Group Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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41 participants in 1 patient group

Decision Aid for Surrogate Decision Makers

Other group

Description:

In this pilot trial all participants will be presented with the decision aid and queried as to the feasibility, acceptability and knowledge translation that is gained by exposure to the decision aid

Treatment:

Other: Decision Aid for Surrogate Decision Makers of Comatose Survivors of Cardiac Arrest