TORONTO–A new report indicates that the higher the floor you live on in an apartment building, the lower your chances for survival in the case of a heart attack.
The Canadian Medical Association Journal released the results of a study it did on Monday called, “Out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in high-rise buildings: delays to patient care and effect on survival.”
The object was to determine if the floor one lives on in a high-rise building impacted the chances for survival in the case of a heart attack at home. The researchers “examined the relations between floor of patient contact and survival after cardiac arrest in residential buildings.” By “patient contact,” the report means where paramedics first had contact with the patient.
The researchers looked back at data from Toronto’s emergency response network dating from January 2007 to December 2012, and examined 7,842 cases involving adults who went into cardiac arrest without a specific cause.
Overall, 3.8 percent, or 300 of the 7,842, survived the heart attack and were eventually discharged from the hospital.
The results showed that living on the third floor or above resulted in a 2.6 percent survival rate (48 of 1,844 patients), while those living below the third floor had a 4.2 percent survival rate (252 of 5,998 patients).
The survival rate for those living above floor 16 was just .9 percent, and there were no survivors of heart attacks in patients who fell ill above the 25th floor.
It’s important to note that while the percentages are relative, a much greater percent of patients lived below the third floor than above: 76.5 percent to 23.5 percent.
Researchers determined, as would be predicted, that younger patients and those who had heart attacks with a witness were more likely to survive. But floor number independently played a role in survival rate as well.
The report indicated in its findings that response time was a leading cause of the lower survival rate, and that “interventions aimed at shortening response times to treatment of cardiac arrest in high-rise buildings may increase survival.” The research team examined the length of time from when first responders arrived at the address of the incident to when the first responders were by the patient’s side instead of just looking at the overall response time.
