Possibility of brain recovery after electrically induced cardiac arrest and reanimation in dogs.

The changes of aortic blood pressure (BP), carotid artery flow (CAF), power spectrum of analysed EEG, neurologic deficit and survival rate were determinated in dogs after experimental cardiac arrest of different duration. Following artificially induced ventricular fibrillation of 1, 4, 10, 12 and 15 min duration successful cardiopulmonary resuscitation was performed in 30 experimental animals. Alterations of power spectrum during and after reanimation procedures, severity of the neurologic state and the survival rate deteriorated in parallel with the increasing duration of circulatory stop. Advantageous effect of direct heart massage could be demonstrated by the measuring circulatory parameters. Following a 15 min fibrillation, all animals were lost in a few hours despite the successful restoration of circulation and ventilation. Considering the various experimental and clinical conditions experimental cardiac arrest lasting for 12 min seems to be useful in extrapolating the results to human cases. The suggested model allows to study the brain function recovery after circulatory stop and resuscitation.