Overview

"Re-establishing blood flow to the vital organs is the single most important factor for successful resuscitation when the duration of cardiac arrest is prolonged beyond four minutes."
 – W. Tang

The 2015 American Heart Association Guidelines continue to put a strong emphasis on high-quality CPR. Push harder, push faster, allow full chest recoil, implement better training protocols, minimize interruptions, restore adequate cerebral and coronary blood flow—the list goes on and on. One fact remains: high quality-CPR can be the difference between life and death. It is not our goal to teach CPR techniques, but rather to review the science, explore the research, and provide information about the tools that can help improve CPR by moving more blood through the heart and raising coronary perfusion pressure to ultimately improve outcomes.