Utility of Abnormal Head Computed Tomography in Predicting Outcome in Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest Victims.

Head computed tomography (HCT) is often performed postcardiac arrest to assess for hypoxic-ischemic brain injury. Our primary objective was to assess whether cerebral edema (CE) on early HCT is associated with poor survival and neurologic outcome after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA).We included subjects from a prospectively collected database of OHCA adults who received targeted temperature management at two hospitals from July 2009 to July 2018. We included cases if an emergency department (ED) HCT was performed. Patient demographics and cardiac arrest variables were collected. HCT results were abstracted from radiology reports. HCT findings were categorized as no acute disease, evidence of CE, or excluded (bleed, tumor, and stroke). Outcomes were survival to discharge or dichotomized discharge cerebral performance category (CPC) of 1-2 (good neurologic outcome) versus 3-5 (poor neurologic outcome). Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed. There were 425 OHCA, of which 315 had ED HCT with 277 cases included. Patients were predominately male (65.0%), average age of 60.9 years and average body mass index of 30.5. Of all cases, 44 (15.9%) showed CE on computed tomography. Univariate analysis demonstrated that CE was associated with 9.2-fold greater odds of poor outcome (odds ratio [OR]: 9.23; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.73-49.2) and 9.1-fold greater odds of death (OR: 9.09, 95% CI 2.4-33.9). In adjusted analysis, CE was associated with a poor CPC outcome (adjusted odds ratios [AOR]: 14.9, 95% CI 2.49-88.4), and death (AOR: 13.7, 95% CI 3.26-57.4). Adjusted survival analysis demonstrated that patients with CE on HCT had 3.6-fold greater hazard of death than those without CE (hazard ratios 3.56, 95% CI 2.34-5.41). The results identify that CE on HCTs early in the postarrest period in OHCA patients is strongly associated with poor rates of survival and neurologic outcome. Prospective work is needed to further define the role of early HCT in postarrest neuroprognostication.