Self Help Tip : How to survive an heart attack when alone.
Let’s say it’s 6.15 pm and you’re driving home (alone of course), after an unusually hard day on the job. You’re really tired, upset and frustrated. Suddenly you start experiencing severe pain in your chest. You don’t know if you’ll be able to make it to the nearest hospital.
Since many people are alone when they suffer a heart attack, without help, the person whose heart is beating improperly and who begins to feel faint, has only about 10 seconds left before losing consciousness. However, these victims can help themselves by coughing repeatedly and very vigorously. A deep breath should be taken before each cough, and the cough must be deep and prolonged, as when producing sputum from deep inside the chest.
Deep breaths get oxygen into the lungs and coughing movements squeeze the heart and keep the blood circulating. The squeezing pressure on the heart also helps it regain normal rhythm.
From Health Cares, Rochester General Hospital via Chapter 240’s newsletter, “AND THE BEAT GOES ON…” (via Anand Nataraj )
P.S : The trick, ofcourse, is to remember this tip when you are grasping your chest and rolling on the floor with searing pain. Hmmm..