[Interposed abdominal compression in mechanical cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Description of a clinical case]

Among the different techniques proposed to integrate the standard cardiopulmonary resuscitation (sCPR) protocol, mechanical CPR (mCPR) and interposed abdominal compression (IAC) were found to be particularly effective for the simplicity of the procedure and the significant results obtained. A case of a 54-year old male with cardiogenic shock following viral infection, in which prolonged mechanical cardiopulmonary resuscitation with interposed abdominal compression was performed, is presented. Five hours after admission in the ICU, the patient's condition worsened with subsequent cardiac arrest with pulseless electrical activity (PEA). Mechanical CPR was promptly started, subsequently associated with IAC and prolonged for 1 hour and 20 minutes. Although the patient survived for only eight hours following cardiac arrest, prolonged IAC-mCPR allowed to start extra corporeal circulation (CPP). The patient was then transferred to the cardiosurgical operating theatre for ventricular assistance by centrifugal pump (VAP). Cardiovascular data obtained from patients monitoring did not shown any cardiac lesions or adverse effects as observed by autoptic examination and suggest the reliability of this mechanical method, which allows a better performance when compared to standard CPR. In prolonged resuscitations a few contraindications to both mCPR and IAC suggest the application of the associated techniques at all times in cardiac arrest, combining the benefits of both procedures.