CAUGHING DURING A HEART ATTACK TO STAY ALIVE IS PURE HOGWASH

I recently received an email from a friend with a massage that said that by breathing deeply and coughing vigorously, heart attack victims can stay alive until help arrives. The message ended by urging that it be passed on. That immediately made me think the advice was phony. And sure enough, the message was pure hogwash. In fact, coughing during a heart attack can be dangerous.

In case you received the same or a similar email, here is an article from The New York Times.

The Claim: You Can Keep Yourself Alive by Coughing During a Heart Attack

By Anahad O’Connor

The New York Times
March 21, 2006

THE FACTS Many Americans know how to perform CPR in an emergency to save someone who slips into cardiac arrest. But a recent widely circulated (and unsigned) e-mail message poses a compelling question: what if you find yourself in need of CPR and there is no one around to perform it?

According to the message, if you feel the radiating chest pains and lightheadedness that often signal a heart attack, you can keep yourself conscious by breathing deeply and coughing vigorously. This supposedly increases oxygen levels and squeezes the heart, allowing blood to circulate.

But experts say the "cough CPR" claim is largely untrue. It may have started because patients having angiograms are sometimes asked to cough forcefully when they have sudden abnormal heartbeats. Coughing deeply can help a person on the verge of passing out — a sign of cardiac arrest — until treatment can be given.

But for someone having a heart attack that does not result in cardiac arrest, coughing can be extremely dangerous. And since most people are not able to tell the difference, coughing during a heart attack is almost always a bad idea, according to the American Heart Association.

A study published in 1998 did find that the technique could be useful for people who suffer from a rare condition known as Stokes-Adams syndrome, which causes heart arrhythmias and frequent fainting. But in typical cases, doctors recommend a tried-and-true technique: call for help and pop an aspirin — quickly.

THE BOTTOM LINE Coughing during a heart attack can be dangerous.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Will people ever learn that when they get an email which tells them to pass it on, the message is almost always as phony as a nine dollar bill?