Background: Little data exists on whether the physicians' skills in responding to cardiac arrest are fully developed after the advanced cardiac life support (ACLS) course, or if there is a significant improvement in their performance after an initial learning curve.
Objective: To estimate the effect of physician experience on the results of prehospital cardiac arrests.
Materials and methods: Prospective data were collected on all prehospital resuscitative attempts in the area by ACLS-trained ambulance physicians.
Results: Of 232 attempted cardiac resuscitations, 96 (41%) patients survived to hospital admission and 44 (19%) were discharged alive. A group of 39 physicians responded to from one up to 29 cases with a mean of four cases. Physicians responding to five or fewer cases had a trend to fewer patients surviving to admission compared with those responding to six or more (36 vs. 45%, P=0.31) but no difference was found on survival to discharge (19 vs. 20%, P=0.87).
Conclusion: In this study, resuscitative experience of the physician did not have a significant effect on survival suggesting that experience does not significantly add to the current ACLS training in responding to ventricular fibrillation/ventricular tachycardia. More studies are needed.