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Dear CARES Community, 
As we look back on 2025, we celebrate a year that has solidified our role as the national standard 
for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) data. This year, CARES achieved an important milestone: 
participation in a cardiac arrest registry, specifically CARES, is now a Class I recommendation from 
the American Heart Association. This recognition reinforces that systematic measurement of cardiac 
arrest outcomes through registries like CARES is essential to building high-functioning resuscitation 
systems and improving survival.
Drs. Bryan McNally and Michael Carr
CARES LEADERSHIP
A MESSAGE FROM 
Over the past year, we have expanded our reach to cover 56% of the United States population, 
logging over 1.3 million cumulative patients and celebrating more than 130,000 survivors since our 
inception. This growth is fueled by the CDC CARES Expansion and Modernization Grant, which has 
enabled us to integrate NEMSIS 3.5 data and strengthen our regional approach across all six CARES 
regions. 
The CARES NextGen platform is now going live. This modernization includes enhanced security, 
improved workflows, flexible reporting fields, and new data visualization dashboards and maps 
powered by Tableau (Read about it here). The platform also supports internationalization and future 
expansion of registry capabilities. By bridging the gap between prehospital and hospital data, we 
are providing communities with more digestible data to identify and strengthen links in the Chain of 
Survival. 
A Year of Unprecedented Growth
As CARES enters its third decade, we are modernizing the platform, the “CAR” of CARES, while turning 
our focus to the “ES”: Enhancing Survival. We are shifting from simply measuring outcomes to actively 
improving them through data-driven insights and innovation.
Our future strategy centers on five pillars:
The Future: Focus on the “ES” (Enhancing Survival)
     Resuscitation Academy–CPR LifeLinks 
Through expanded partnerships with the Resuscitation Academy and the CPR 
LifeLinks initiative, CARES will help communities translate data into action. Using 
registry insights, we will identify opportunities to strengthen key links in the 
Chain of Survival, such as dispatcher-assisted CPR, bystander intervention, and 
high-performance resuscitation practices, and connect local leaders with proven 
training programs and implementation strategies that have improved survival in 
high-performing systems.
     Enhanced Regional Communication
Within each of the six CARES regions, our team will facilitate regular quarterly 
meetings focused on quality improvement, benchmarking, and shared 
learning. These regional forums will allow neighboring states and agencies 
to exchange best practices, discuss operational challenges, and highlight 
successful initiatives. By strengthening regional collaboration, we can 
accelerate the spread of effective resuscitation strategies across communities.

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