Is there a medical conspiracy involving heart attacks?
 

A guy has a heart attack. Someone is there right away to start CPR until paramedics arrive. Not even the ER is able to restart his heart. He is pronounced dead.

This is the leading cause of death in the world. If you are reading this, there is a good chance this is how your life will end. But hold on a minute....

The only thing wrong with the victim is that his heart will not start back up. Nothing else in his body is damaged.

Think about this for a second.

Instead of being pronounced dead and sent to the grave, shouldn't heart attack victims be sent to the operating room to have an artificial heart put in?

What reasons are there for not doing this?

the severe brain damage from lack of oxygen to the brain might be one factor...

Because the Bush administration won't allow it... Artificial hearts are against the Christian faith. It's regarded as bad as cloning.

because they dont know

Newsweek or Time had a long story on a new method - brining the body temperature of the person down and then gradually reviving them.

There was some study that found trying to bring the heart back is what kill patients because cells are infused with oxygen too fast which triggers them to destroy themselves, something along those lines.

Problem is the geniuses can't agree on what method if any is workable

Google it, it will give you a pretty good answer

You are talking about something totally different than I am. What I mean is when there is no more attempts at trying to save the heart.

Keep in mind that CPR is the bare minimum you can do to keep someone alive. If CPR is not performed properly the perfusion in the persons system is to low to keep them alive. Not giving enough breaths, compressions not deep enough, wrong hand placement on the compressions etc., all lead to bad CPR, which will result in permanent damage.

Using a AED (Automatic External Defibrilator) will help increase the chances of survival when used quickly, however there are only certain rythms that are shockable (Ventricular Fibrilation and Ventricular Tachycardia).

There are so many variables to CPR and keeping someone alive, technique, time etc that it is rarely keeping someone viable. There are some new advances in technology out there but most are used in small quantities. For example the new auto pulse CPR machine: http://www.zoll.com/product.aspx?id=84

The problem is they are expensive. Sorry for my long post, just my training as a medic kicking in. :)