Background: Unnecessary resuscitation is defined as putting in a disproportionate amount of effort compared to the patients' prognosis and chance of survival. The primary objective of this study was to determine the number of resuscitations perceived as unnecessary by emergency medical personnel and to correlate it with the characteristics of resuscitation team members, patient particularities and organizational factors related to the professional environment.
Methods: This was a prospective cross-sectional study carried out in the emergency department of a university hospital, exploring the perception of the uselessness of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) through the completion of a questionnaire.
Results: In total, 70.37% of respondents are often involved in CPR attempts in which the efforts made are disproportionate compared to the patients' expected prognosis, in terms of survival or quality of life. The presence of a non-shockable rhythm increased, by two times, the chances of medical staff finding it unnecessary to initiate CPR.
Conclusions: The current study was the first in Romania to investigate the perception of unnecessary CPR, based on the recollection of the last resuscitation performed by the emergency medical staff. The objective criteria related to the patient were the most important predictors for assessing the adequacy of the decision to initiate CPR.
Keywords: cardiopulmonary resuscitation; emergency department staff; ethics; quality of life; unnecessary CPR.