What to Expect After Suffering a Cardiac Arrest
What Happens After You Suffer A Cardiac Arrest?
Cardiac arrest is the medical term for when your heart suddenly stops beating. Sometimes this term is used interchangeably with 'heart attack', but these are two different medical conditions. A heart attack is when there is a block in blood flow to the heart, and cardiac arrest is when the heart stops beating suddenly. However, more than 70% of cardiac arrests happen due to a heart attack.
A victim of cardiac arrest is at grave risk and need to be attended to urgently. Failure to get immediate help can be fatal or lead to permanent brain injury. When a cardiac arrest happens, you will experience chest pain accompanied by difficulty in breathing or a complete inability to breathe. You may also collapse and lose consciousness. Cardiac arrest may be reversed if CPR is performed and an AED is used to shock the heart and restore a normal rhythm immediately.
Many public places are required to have an AED on premises, but having an AED in the home that can be used at a moment's notice can make a significant difference to the chances of survival.
Cardiac Arrest: What to Do
1. Call 911 or your local emergency response number - emergency medical services can begin treatment as soon as they arrive.
2. Get a hold of an AED and use it immediately. The AED will take a reading of the patient's heart rhythm and automatically deploy a shock if needed.
3. Perform CPR immediately until the emergency medical services arrives. If there are two bystanders available to help, one should use the AED and the other should begin CPR simultaneously until professional help arrives.
Emergency medical services will be able to begin professional treatment upon arrival, as they are transporting the patient to the hospital - this means that patients can be treated much sooner than if they had gotten to a hospital by car.
How is it diagnosed at the hospital?
A cardiac arrest will ordinarily start as an interruption to the normal rhythm of your heartbeat. Diagnosis will therefore involve finding the cause of this disruption. Abnormal heart rhythm is referred to as arrhythmia. To pinpoint the kind of arrhythmia you’ve suffered, the cardiologist will want to perform an ECG or electrocardiogram.
In addition to this, your cardiologist will want to confirm if the arrest is the manifestation of an underlying heart condition. For this reason he or she will also want you to undergo a chest x-ray as well as a blood test. The latter will reveal if your potassium and magnesium levels are below normal. These two minerals play an important role in maintaining the rhythm of your heartbeat.
What can you expect?
When you’re rushed into an emergency room after suffering a cardiac arrest, the medical personnel who receive you will want to get your heart beating in a regular rhythm as quickly as possible. To do this they will try to jolt it with a controlled electrical shock using a defibrillator.
This is why using an AED immediately following cardiac arrest, combined with CPR, is imperative to ensure the highest chance of survival for the patient as possible. An automated external defibrillator, much like the defibrillator used in hospitals, delivers an electric current to the heart to try to shock it back into rhythm. A victim's chances of surviving drops by 7-10% for every minute after cardiac arrest without the help of an AED and CPR. Because AEDs are portable and designed to be used by non-medical people, having one always close by can make a significant difference. If you or a family member are at risk of suffering from cardiac arrest, you should seriously consider purchasing one for the home.
After you’ve been put out of immediate danger, further treatments will be prescribed to reduce your chances of suffering another arrest. Care for post-cardiac arrest patients is often a combination between identifying and treating the underlying cause.
About The Myra Logan Heart Fund
AEDs save lives. Of the 424,000 cases of out-of-hospital cardiac arrests that happen annually in the United States, only 10% of victims survive. The chances of survival increase from 6% to 74% if an AED (Automated External Defibrillator) is used to deliver shock therapy within three to five minutes of a heart attack, but tragically only a tiny fraction of cardiac arrest victims in the United States ever get the immediate help they need.
The Myra Logan Heart Fund’s mission is to get an AED into every home, office and school. Its purpose is to educate the public about the importance of AEDs, increase their accessibility, and empower people to save lives.