Relevance of Living Wills During Post-Resuscitation Care

Background There is hardly any evidence about the influence of living wills on acute life-threatening disease like out-of-hospital cardiac-arrest (OHCA). We therefore initiated this study to quantify the percentage of victims of OHCA who's living wills are available during post-resuscitation care. Methods All victims of OHCA who were admitted to our hospital between January 1st 2008 and July 31th 2016 were identified by analysis of our central admission register. Data from individual patients were collected from the patient's health records and anonymously stored on a central database. Results Altogether, there were 343 victims of OHCA admitted to our hospital between January 1st 2008 and July 31th 2016, including 16 patients (4.7 %) with living wills and 18 patients (5.2 %) with legal health care proxy. Survival rates were 31.2 % in patients with living wills, 27.8 % in patients with legal health care proxy and 33.3 % in patients without such a document. Conclusion In this study, the percentage of victims of OHCA with available living wills during post-resuscitation care was low. The presentation of living wills or legal health care proxies during post-resuscitation care of victims from OHCA was not equivalent to the patient`s death. Most often, discussion with relatives led to the decision to withdraw further therapy.