Post Cardiac Arrest Brain Injury

Resuscitation from a cardiac arrest is a common reason for admission to an intensive care unit (ICU). Because the brain is highly vulnerable to oxygen deprivation, severe brain damage often occurs during a cardiac arrest. Even when the heart has been restarted, there may continue to be reduced blood flow and oxygen delivery to the brain for many hours. ICU professionals generally do not use any tools to detect low oxygen delivery to the brain. Most patients admitted to the ICU are initially in a coma and many will never awaken. Even if they regain consciousness, there may be long-term cognitive and functional disabilities. There are currently no specific treatments available to ICU professionals that are proven to limit brain damage and improve outcomes. Cerebral oximetry is a non-invasive, painless, safe, and easy-to-use tool that detects reduced oxygen delivery to the brain using a sensor over the forehead. Previous research shows that reduced brain oxygen levels \[(regional oxygen saturation (RSO2)\] are predictive of a lower chance of awakening and having a good neurological recovery. This study will assess treatment guided by cerebral oximetry during the initial 48 hours following cardiac arrest. Patients that are in a coma after their circulation has been restarted will be randomly allocated to either usual care based on international guidelines or a protocol aimed at maintaining RSO2 above 60% on both sides of the brain. Cerebral oximetry will be recorded in all patients, but doctors will only be aware of it in one group. If RSO2 drops below 60% for more than 5 minutes, doctors will try to increase it. Actions taken to increase RSO2 may include raising the blood pressure by giving more intravenous fluid or using life-support drugs ("vasoconstrictors" like norepinephrine), stimulating the heart to pump more strongly with medications ("inotropes" like dobutamine, milrinone, or epinephrine), adjusting ventilator settings (to increase the amount of oxygen dissolved in blood or raise carbon dioxide levels, which increases blood flow to the brain), lowering the head of the bed (to increase blood flow to the brain), or giving a blood transfusion (only if the patient has anemia). When RSO2 has been corrected to at least 60% for more than 2 hours, doctors may reverse previous interventions. If they are unable to achieve the goal of 60%, they may lower the target. Efforts to maintain RSO2 in the target range will continue for 48 hours. Investigators will assess how well the protocol works and whether it helps avoid critically low brain oxygen levels. Investigators will also measure various "biomarkers" in the blood that are released when the brain is damaged to see if they are lower when cerebral oximetry is used to guide treatment.

Approximately 15,200 children receive cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) for in-hospital cardiac arrest (IHCA) each year in the United States. Of these, about 60% are less than one year of age. Most IHCA (85-90%) occurs in intensive care units (ICU) or other monitored settings. Risk of IHCA is higher among children with cardiac disease compared to children with other diagnoses. A report based on the Pediatric Cardiac Critical Care Consortium (PC4) registry found 3.1% of children hospitalized in pediatric cardiac ICUs had a cardiac arrest; rates varied from 1% to 5.5 % across sites. Survival to hospital discharge after CA in children included in the PC4 registry was 53%, and lower for medical cardiac patients (37.7%) than for surgical cardiac patients (62.5%). Among survivors of pediatric IHCA, neurologic morbidities are common including cognitive, motor, and adaptive functional deficits. Despite high mortality and morbidity, treatment for children after IHCA is mainly supportive. Preventing fever and hypotension, maintaining normoxia, and treating seizures are emphasized. Ischemia-reperfusion injury to the brain is a primary cause of neurologic morbidity after IHCA. Ischemia-reperfusion leads to increased production of cytotoxic mitochondrial reactive oxygen species (ROS). Recently, specific wavelengths of near infrared light (NIR) (750 nm and 950 nm) have been discovered to partially inhibit cytochrome c oxidase activity (COX), reversibly reducing mitochondrial respiration and generation of ROS. Light Utilization COX Inhibitory Device (LUCID) is a novel medical device intended to safely deliver therapeutic NIR to the infant brain to prevent reperfusion injury. This protocol describes the "LUCID Therapy for Infant Cardiac Arrest" (LUTICA) clinical trial. LUTICA will investigate the safety, feasibility, acceptability, and probable benefit of the LUCID device in infants with acquired or congenital cardiac disease who experience unplanned IHCA. The hypothesis of the LUTICA trial is that application of the LUCID light box and cap immediately following IHCA in infants with acquired or congenital heart disease will be safe, feasible, and acceptable in the ICU setting, and demonstrate probable benefit toward favorable neurological outcomes.

Median nerve stimulation (MNS), a non-invasive brain stimulation technique, has been widely adopted in clinical arousal therapies and multiple clinical investigations have attested to the efficacy of this technique; nevertheless, evidence concerning the application of MNS in improving the neurological prognosis of patients with return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC) following cardiac arrest (CA) remains scarce. The current study endeavors to assess the safety and efficacy of MNS treatment in enhancing the neurological prognosis of CA patients after ROSC and it is designed as a multicenter, prospective, randomized controlled trial with an estimated sample size of 400 patients. Eligible patients will be randomly allocated in a 1:1 ratio to either receive MNS treatment or sham stimulation treatment for 8 hours per day for 14 consecutive days and the primary outcome measure is the proportion of patients in each group with a Cerebral Performance Category (CPC) score ranging from 1 to 2, 6 months after randomization, which will help to determine the effectiveness of MNS in providing neuroprotection for patients with ROSC after CA.