Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC is one of 34 clinical centers across the United States and Canada that will participate in a $21 million federal study over six years to explore the use of body cooling to treat cardiac arrest in newborns and children.
The technique, known as therapeutic hypothermia, has been used successfully in adults to improve survival after cardiac arrest, but it hasn't been studied in infants or children.
Cardiac arrest in infants and children can be caused by strangulation, drowning or trauma, as well as certain medical conditions.
The study is being launched by the National, Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health. Participants in the study must be older than 48 hours and younger than 18. More information about the study can be found at http://clinicaltrials.gov/.