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Showing posts from June, 2020

What Should You Do When Someone Faints

Fainting happens when your brain doesn’t get enough blood, and that causes you to briefly lose consciousness. What Causes Fainting: Hyperventilation Low blood sugar. Being pregnant Having anemia. Emotional stress. How to Diagnose  VASOVAGAL SYNCOPE How to Tell If Someone May Faint: *The patient says they feel nauseous. * Yawning frequently * Feelings of restless * Complaints of feeling lightheaded or dizzy * The skin looks pale, feels cool and may be clammy or sweaty * Complaining of tightness in the chest * Having palpitations

What are Bundle Branch Block, Animation

Bundle branch blocks happen when there is an obstruction in one of the bundle branches. The names “left bundle branch block” and “right bundle branch block” indicate the side that is affected. In a normal heart, the two ventricles are depolarized simultaneously by the two bundles and contract at the same time. In bundle branch blocks, the UN-affected ventricle depolarizes first. The electrical impulses THEN move through the myocardium to the other side. This results in a DELAYED and SLOWED depolarization of the affected ventricle, hence a broader QRS complex — typically longer than 120 milliseconds; and a loss in ventricular synchrony. Left and right bundle branch blocks are diagnosed and differentiated by looking at ECG recordings obtained from the CHEST leads, which register signal movements in a horizontal plane. Of these, the most useful are leads V1 and V6 as they are best located to detect impulses moving between the left and right ventricles. Activation of the ventricles st...

Atrial Fibrillation Guidelines 2020

Atrial Fibrillation Guideline updates. For those of you not aware, we have major cardiology groups and other physiology groups like the American College of Cardiology and the Heart Rhythm Society, which every few years, release joint statements about  how to manage atrial fibrillation . They usually incorporate things that have had major changes that can influence and management of patients with atrial fibrillation. And so in 2019, they released a focused update. It’s not a complete overhaul of the guidelines, but it did emphasize some new treatment options or new treatment options and new treatment guidelines for doctors and patients out there, which I wanted to emphasize to you today. So the first thing in the guideline was that changes into blood thinners that the newer category of blood thinners, sometimes called NOACs or DOACs, which includes new blood thinners, like Eliquis or Xarelto or Pradaxa or Savaysa, are now preferred over warfarin, meaning these are the prefe...