Mechanical Chest Compression Devices: Historical Evolution, Classification and Current Practices, A Short Review

The standard treatment of cardiac arrest is cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), performed with effective manual chest compressions. Although current CPR was developed 50 years ago, cardiac arrest still has a high mortality rate and manual chest compressions have some potential limitations. Because of these limitations, mechanical chest compression devices were developed to improve the efficiency of CPR. This CPR technology includes devices such as the mechanical piston load-distributing band, active compression–decompression CPR, simultaneous sterno-thoracic CPR, impedance threshold valve, phased thoracic-abdominal active compression–decompression CPR and active compression-decompression CPR with enhanced external counterpulsation, and the impedance threshold valve. The purpose of this manuscript was to draw attention to developments in this medical area and to examine studies on the effectiveness of these devices. (Eurasian J Emerg Med 2016; 15: 94-104)