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dreamcompilerlast Saturday at 8:15 PM2 repliesview on HN

Correct. The shockable rhythms are ventricular fibrillation and ventricular tachycardia (racing heart). Fortunately these rhythms occur in many heart attacks.

Unfortunately PEA and asystole (flatline) do too, and shocking won't fix those -- despite what movies and TV would often have you believe.


Replies

5555624last Saturday at 9:06 PM

> despite what movies and TV would often have you believe.

Yeah, I found out the hard way, suffering PEA. AEDs are great; but, people should still learn CPR.

FireBeyondlast Saturday at 8:31 PM

Precisely. Well, when you're talking about AEDs - VF and VT.

Defib is more like rebooting a malfunctioning heart, versus jump starting it.

Paramedics with a manual defibrillator can do other things with other rhythms, but AEDs are limited to those.