Administration of Erythropoietin in a swine model of prolonged cardiac arrest

Purpose of the study: Recombinant human erythropoietin (rh-EPO) has been shown to exert tissue protective properties in various experimental models. However, its potential role in the cardiac arrest (CA) setting has not yet been sufficiently elucidated. The purpose of our study was to evaluate the effect of rh-EPO administration in swine model of ventricular fibrillation (VF) CA. The primary goal of our study was to investigate whether rh-EPO exerts any beneficial effect on Return of Spontaneous Circulation (ROSC) rates, while the secondary aim was to assess its impact in the short-term basis of 24-h and 48-h survival.