Cardiac arrest is a condition when the heart stops beating the blood flow through the body stops and no oxygen can reach the brain. Cardiac arrests occur suddenly and often without any warning signs or symptoms. Heart disease is not the only cause of cardiac arrest, however, electrocution, choking, drowning, and trauma can also cause the heart’s electrical activity to go awry and the heart to stop pumping blood.
Transport to the hospital should not be delayed for patients who are resuscitated from cardiac arrest. The hospital, where both personnel and technical resources are plentiful and readily available, offers the best potential for a positive patient outcome. In the hospital, all those who engagement in cardiac arrest patient care should be trained in Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS).
Advanced cardiac life support (ACLS) is a systematic approach to resuscitative efforts to cardiac arrest patients. In most health care facilities, ACLS-trained nurses provide the first resuscitative efforts to cardiac arrest patients until the practitioner arrives. To get ACLS certification, nurses and other paramedics should pass the ACLS exam. They can take the ACLS exam both offline or online.