Looking for a soup to nuts discussion of cardiac arrest management? The don’t miss today’s “Code Talkers: A Point-Counterpoint Dialogue of Cardiac Arrest Management and What They Don’t Teach in ACLS,” led by William J. Brady, MD, FACEP, professor of emergency medicine and medical director, Emergency Management, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia; and Corey M. Slovis, MD, FACEP, professor and chairman, Department of Emergency Medicine, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville.

Dr. Brady

In an interactive and entertaining presentation, Dr. Brady and Dr. Slovis will focus on four main areas: the care patients receive before the emergency department or hospital, medication management in cardiac arrest, airway management, and the care involved when measuring targeted temperature management and PCI.

One area that Dr. Brady and Dr. Slovis will address that may cause confusion among emergency physicians is invasive airways. “In certain patients at certain times, airway is important,” Dr. Brady said. “But it’s not the most important intervention in all patients at all times. The situation is defined by medical events and the time at which the intervention is occurring.”

Dr. Slovis

Another area they will discuss is ventricular fibrillation and anti-arrhythmic therapy—and whether the current Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS) recommendations are the state of the art, Dr. Slovis said. There’s new evidence that amiodarone and lidocaine have about the same efficacy in this patient group. “It’s much easier to give a push of lidocaine,” Dr. Slovis said. They will also look at other management strategies for ventricular fibrillation, such as pad placement and the use of beta blockers—two things not part of the ACLS recommendations, Dr. Slovis said.

Vanessa Caceres is a freelance medical writer based in Florida.