Heart attack has become a common term nowadays. Heart attack is one of the major causes of death worldwide. It is true that thousands of people die due to heart attack each year. Unlike popularly believe, heart attack will not stop the functioning of heart but it only damages and weakens the heart muscle. Most of the cases die within few minutes if prompt medical care is not given.
Heart :
Your heart is about the size of your fist and includes 4 chambers of which two are auricles and two are ventricles. Various valves are connected with these chambers for helping to and fro movement of oxygenated blood.
- Impure blood is received by the heart and pumped into the lungs wherein it gets transformed to oxygenated blood. This type of pure blood is sent to every organ of the body through ventricle. If your heart functions well, you can be sure that sufficient oxygen supply is given to the entire body.
- When the heart stops its function of pumping blood suddenly, the cells in the body gets deprived of oxygen. This makes them unable to perform its functions normally and cell death occurs within minutes. This in turn causes death. Death occurs almost instantly when the blood and oxygen supply is cut off to the brain.
Why Does The Heart Stop ?
The pumping activity of the heart is done in specific rhythm and the electrical impulses are generated there making the heart to contract and relax. As long as there is electrical activity in the heart, it can function well. Due to some factors, this rhythm gets interrupted causing irregular heartbeat. This in turn leads to sudden cardiac arrest. Many times, this kind of irregular heartbeat is made normal by the heart which is capable of generating nerve impulses. However the heart may stop functioning when there is severe and persistent irregular heartbeat.