Every year, 250,000 people die from sudden cardiac arrest. The chance of surviving sudden cardiac arrest is approximately 5%, and literature is replete with data illustrating that the single most effective factor in determining on which side of the 5% one ends up is TTD, or time to defibrillation.
Defibrillation is the process of applying a DC current (200-360 joules of energy) to reset aberrant electrochemical gradients in the myocardium that cause the heart to beat chaotically and ineffectually. The defibrillator is a device that delivers an electrical shock to the heart in order to stop certain forms of rapid heart rhythm disturbances (arrhythmias). The shock changes a fibrillation to an organized rhythm or changes a very rapid and ineffective cardiac rhythm to a slower, more effective one.
In a typical hospital defibrillator, voltage stored by the defibrillator pushes electrical current through the chest to deliver a muscle-contracting jolt to the heart; the current is transmitted by means of electrodes or paddles placed on the chest. Automated external defibrillators (AED's) or defibrillators, are designed for use by persons with minimal medical training in emergencies when medical professionals are unavailable. AED’s are used today by both professionals and consumers. Professional units are used by hospitals and EMT (Emergency Medical Technicians) in ambulances. Consumer devices are showing up everywhere and can be found in airplanes, malls, offices, etc, and some companies, in a progressive move, are even working towards have them placed in the home.
By Steve Kennelly, Microchip Technology, Inc. The recent ruckus over the newly available vaccine for Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) got me thinking about the possible future of implanted electronic medical devices.