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Background: Therapeutic hypothermia improves neurologic outcome and survival in patients following out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA). Endovascular cooling devices are commonly used to rapidly achieve and maintain hypothermia. The use of these devices may be associated with catheter related thrombosis. The objective of this study was to determine the risk of catheter related thrombosis associated with the use of an endovascular cooling catheter in patients referred for therapeutic hypothermia following OHCA., Methods and Results: We conducted a retrospective cohort study on consecutive patients, referred for therapeutic hypothermia following OHCA, between February 2012 and May 2013. Of 80 patients initially treated with therapeutic hypothermia, 61 completed the cooling protocol using an endovascular cooling device. The primary outcome was catheter related thrombosis defined as evidence of thrombus in the inferior vena cava, deep vein thrombosis or pulmonary embolism during the index hospitalization. We further evaluated the incidence of the primary outcome between patients on dose adjusted intravenous unfractionated heparin compared to those on a subcutaneous prophylactic regimen alone. Catheter related thrombosis was observed in 9/61 (14.7%), with nine events in the prophylaxis group compared to none in the full dose unfractionated heparin group (22.0% vs. 0.0%, p=0.02)., Conclusions: The use of endovascular catheters for induction of therapeutic hypothermia is associated with a high rate of catheter related thrombosis. This risk appears to be abrogated with dose adjusted unfractionated heparin infusion., (Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background: Therapeutic hypothermia (TH) is associated with improved neurologic outcomes in comatose survivors of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA). There are currently limited data on the outcomes of patients presenting with resuscitated OHCA in the setting of ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI). We conducted a retrospective study to determine the outcomes of patients treated with TH for OHCA in a large regionalized STEMI program., Methods: Patients referred for primary PCI and TH between July 2004 and April 2011 were identified from the University of Ottawa Heart Institute STEMI database. The primary endpoint was survival to hospital discharge with sufficient neurologic recovery to enable discharge home., Results: Among 2467 consecutive patients referred for primary PCI, we identified 50 patients treated with TH following OHCA. Forty-nine underwent PCI, of which 47 (96%) received a stent. Median door-to-balloon time was 113min (IQR 91-151). Patients with good neurologic recovery were younger, mean 51 ± 9 years versus 64 ± 12, p<0.001, and had higher baseline creatinine clearance, 70 ± 19 mL/min/1.73 m(2) versus 53 ± 23 mL/min/1.73 m(2), p=0.007. The primary endpoint of survival with sufficient neurologic recovery to enable discharge home was reached in 30 patients (60%). Four survivors required levels of assistance that precluded discharge home., Conclusions: Therapeutic hypothermia in conjunction with primary PCI is associated with a favorable neurologic outcome in the majority of STEMI patients surviving OHCA. Our results suggest that TH is an important adjunctive therapy for STEMI patients suffering OHCA., (Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.)