Bottom line: Socioeconomic differences in outcomes of cardiac arrest are present in the pediatric population as well and CPR education and resources should be present in ALL communities.

Additional Information

Previous studies have shown that socioeconomic differences are seen out of hospital cardiac arrests in adults.  This study investigates these differences in the pediatric population. 

This was a retrospective cohort study of the Cardiac Arrest Registry to Enhance Survival looking at out of hospital cardiac arrests in patients < 18 years.  An index score was developed including race, household income, high school graduation rates and unemployment rates with a score of 4 representing the highest risk neighborhoods.  Children from the areas with the highest risk score had lower odds of survival to hospital discharge and neurologically favorable survival compared to the lowest risk neighborhoods. 

In the 6945 pediatric arrests included, 33% occurred in black children, 31% in white children and 10% in Hispanic children.  41% of the arrests occurred in the highest risk neighborhoods.  Black children had a lower odds of survival to hospital discharge (OR 0.73) and discharge with neurologically favorable outcome (OR 0.64) compared to white children.  Hispanic children did not have any worse survival outcomes compared to white children.  This data also fits in with other studies that have shown children from high risk neighborhoods and black children as less likely to receive bystander CPR compared to white children and children in low risk neighborhoods.

References

Gathers CL, Rossano JW, Griffis H, McNally B, Al-Araji R, Berg RA, Chung S, Nadkarni V, Tobin JM, Naim MY. Sociodemographic disparities in incidence and survival for pediatric out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in the United States. Resuscitation. 2025 Jun;211:110607. doi: 10.1016/j.resuscitation.2025.110607. Epub 2025 Apr 15. PMID: 40246165.