DALLAS and STAVANGER, Norway, October 16, 2023 — For nearly 20 years, the American Heart Association® (Association) and Laerdal Medical (Laerdal) have together developed and brought resuscitation education, training and technology to the health care market. The Association and Laerdal will now expand their focus beyond education to creating and nurturing health care quality improvement solutions to impact a community "systems of care" approach and influence more positive patient outcomes. This World Restart a Heart Day, the organizations are furthering their collaborative relationship and have committed to help save an additional 1 million lives by 2030 each year by being a catalyst for improving access and the quality of lifesaving emergency systems of care for all.
With a shared mission to help save more lives from cardiac arrest, the American Heart Association, the world's leading voluntary organization dedicated to a world of longer, healthier lives for all, and Laerdal Medical, one of the world leaders in medical simulation and resuscitation training, have co-developed and brought innovative resuscitation quality improvement programs, education and training to health care providers for decades. The organizations' early collaborative products include the HeartCode® portfolio in the mid-1990s, followed by the CPR Anytime Kit™ and CPR in Schools Training Kit™, debuting in 2004 and 2013, respectively.
Some of their more recent introductions include the Resuscitation Quality Improvement® Program (RQI®) and RQI for NRP® (Neonatal Resuscitation Program®), in collaboration with the American Academy of Pediatrics.
"We have decades of shared innovations of which we are very proud, and programs that continue to succeed and flourish to help us realize our commitment to help save an additional 1 million lives by 2030 each year," said Alf-Christian Dybdahl, Laerdal Medical chief executive officer. "Focusing on the road ahead, our renewed alliance signals our expanded scope of work dedicated to promising current and future projects to improve resuscitation and emergency care outcomes and health care quality and access as a whole."
There are several strategies that will jointly power the commitment to save one million more lives each year by 2030. Both organizations are participating in the World Health Organization's Acute Care Action Network (ACAN) to strengthen emergency care systems in low and middle-income countries by training and supporting 250,000 nurses and midwives in these countries.
Further supporting this commitment is the newly launched Nation of Lifesavers campaign by the Association calling people to become part of a movement to help double survivor rates from sudden cardiac arrest by 2030. Additionally, expanding the RQI program footprint globally and embracing efforts to improve emergency, critical and operative care for universal health coverage and protection from health emergencies will augment the robust activations that are helping drive the Alliance renewal.
Central to the Association and Laerdal Alliance is RQI Partners LLC, the partnership between and service provider for resuscitation programs for the organizations. Formed in 2018, the company is charged with accelerating adoption of their co-developed digital resuscitation education and training by hospitals and health systems, emergency medical services agencies and nursing programs at U.S. colleges and universities. Since the RQI program launch eight years ago, more than 2,400 hospitals and 2 million nurses globally are using their modernized, digital CPR training solutions. More importantly, it is estimated that more than 20,000 lives have been saved.
"Our commitment to resuscitation education and training is unwavering and remains firmly intact," said John Meiners, American Heart Association chief of mission-aligned businesses and health care solutions. "Today's announcement signals a renewed intent to expand our commitment to help save an additional 1 million lives, each year, by 2030. We will continue directing our respective resources, science, education and technology to being a catalyst for dramatically improving access and quality of health care for all. Since 2005, we have leaned into innovation to effect change in health care and challenge the status quo — using the RQI program portfolio as the standard of quality improvement resuscitation care. This will hold true through this recommitment, with the additional focus on challenging standards of care across multidisciplinary health care practices."
The core tenets that will drive the Association and Laerdal Alliance focus through 2030 and fuel mission achievement to help save an additional 1 million lives by 2030 each year include:
- Helping prevent and improve the response to emergency events
- Creating a culture rooted in quality improvement learning within the emergency care landscape
- Challenging the standards of care
- Reaching new audiences
- Embracing a global mission and continuing to support the Global Resuscitation Alliance
- Supporting emergency care research
- Directing financial contributions to the lifesaving mission
- Expanding CPR in Schools
"The World Health Organization has more than 30 million deaths documented annually that are the result of time-critical emergencies.[1] Cardiac arrest ranks among the top in this category. Pairing our co-developed CPR training and education solutions with other evidence-based, well implemented interventions creates the potential for real change and improved access and quality of care," Dybdahl said.
