June 14th, 2011 by IsisTheScientist in Health Tips
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I think one of the greatest public safety advances of the last 15 years has been the widespread installation of automated external defibrillators (AEDs). Automated external defibrillators are medical devices designed to deliver an electrical shock to the heart in ventricular fibrillation – a cardiac rhythm that is commonly associated with cardiac arrest.
Figure 1: ECG of a heart devolving into ventricular fibrillation.
I was working in emergency medicine when medical device companies first began to advocate for the placement of AEDs in public places and worked closely with many companies, organizations, and government agencies to incorporate AEDs into their emergency response plans. This wasn’t an easy sell in the late 1990s. People were worried about safety, liability, and cost. But, AED programs have been a great success. AEDs are most effective when they are used within 3-5 minutes of arrest. For example, if you have a cardiac arrest with ventricular fibrillation in New York City, Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at On Becoming a Domestic and Laboratory Goddess*
March 11th, 2011 by John Mandrola, M.D. in News, Opinion
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It’s heart wrenching when young athletes die of sudden cardiac death (SCD). Last week the death of Wes Leonard, a Michigan high school star athlete, was especially poignant since he collapsed right after making the game-winning shot. This sort of tragedy occurs about one hundred times each year in America. That’s a lot of sadness. The obvious question is: Could these deaths be prevented? Let’s start with what actually happens.
Most cases of sudden death in young people occur as a result of either hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), an abnormal thickening of heart muscle, or long QT syndrome (LQTS), a mostly inherited disease of the heart’s electrical system. Both HCM and LQTS predispose the heart to ventricular fibrillation — electrical chaos of the pumping chamber of the heart. The adrenaline surges of athletic competition increase the odds of this chaos. Unfortunately, like heart disease often does, both these ailments can strike without warning.
Sudden death is sad enough by itself, but what makes it even worse is that both these ailments are mostly detectable with two simple painless tests: The ECG and echocardiogram (heart ultrasound). Let’s get these kids ECGs and echos then. “Git ‘er dun,” you might say.
On the surface the solution seems simple: Implement universal cardiac screening of all young athletes. And you wouldn’t be alone in thinking this way. You could even boast the support of Dr. Manny Alvarez of Fox News and the entire country of Italy, where all athletes get ECGs and echos before competing. But America isn’t Italy, and things aren’t as simple as Fox News likes to suggest. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Dr John M*
