The urban-rural divide in cardiac arrest survival

Abstract

This paper provides a commentary on the recently published "The incidence and outcomes of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in metropolitan versus rural locations: A systematic review and meta-analysis". The importance of this work due to the systematic search for the evidence and relative consistency of studies in terms of the direction of effect is highlighted. The commentary includes discussion on the variability between studies and the urban-rural differences in clinical care. Opportunities for future research are described, as well as the need to adequately characterise the local conditions and community engagement so that the applicability of research findings can be determined for local contexts.

Keywords: Community engagement; Epidemiology; Out-of-hospital cardiac arrest; Resuscitation; Urban–rural.