Nursing Interventions Following Sudden Cardiac Arrest

The intervention consisted of structured information (SI) provided in a booklet, nursing telephone support (NTS) and access to a nurse pager 24h/day. The SI booklet, Sudden Cardiac Arrest: A Survivor's Experience, contains 2 components: a descriptive component including individual verbatim statements about experiences of others during the first year of recovery and a management component outlining successful strategies used by others in dealing with issues in recovery. The NTS telephone calls included: check-in about current concerns, assessment of the topic for the week, review of common recovery experiences, discussion of behavioral strategies for dealing with the topic for the week, provision of positive feedback for strategies already working well, anxiety reduction statements, practice of new behaviors using role-playing and problem solving techniques, summarization, setting specific goals for the upcoming week, and collaborating on a learning assignment for the subsequent week.