Defibrillation in the Cardiac Arrest Patient.

Defibrillation is one of the few interventions known to favorably impact survival in cardiac arrest. In witnessed arrest, survival improves with defibrillation as early as possible, whereas it may improve outcomes to administer high-quality chest compressions for 90 seconds before defibrillation in unwitnessed arrest. Minimizing pre-, peri-, and post-shock pauses has been shown to have mortality benefits.