The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-03-09

of the North American Newspaper
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 evelope. .4'
 Electric Shock
 Now and then the newspapers carry stories of persons who have died in the bath while using household mas sage or vibration devices. Again, the accounts tell of telegraph linemen who have been shocked by contact with high power wires or through peculiar transmissions of current from ordinary wiring. Still other persons have been shocked while using electric irons, cookers. heating pads. washing machines or similar household devices. When the total number of such devices now used is considered, the accidents are relatively very few. It is not the pur- pose here to warn anyone from the use of such time and labor saving conven- fences. Nevertheless, accidents do ,oc- cur, and persons should be prepared to administer proper first aid measures.
 One of the first effects of. electric shock is to produce unconsciousness, following which there is asphyxia as a result of oxygen lack in the blood going stO the brain. The effects vary between momentary stopping of breath ing and a degree of damage from which recovery is impossible. Another eff feet is fibpiilation-rapid vibration or twitching-of the heart muscle. When this involves the muscles of the heart its pumping function is lost; the ven tricles or chamber of the heart do not contract in the usual matner and the tissues of the body are deprived of fresh blood. AZ
 According to Dr. Cecil K. Drinker, who has given special attention to the problem, the first step in the correc- tion of the condition is artificial respir- ation. If the action of the heart has not been disturbed. persistent artificial respiration will often bring about re- covery.
 In the Schaefer method of artificial respiration the person is placed flat on his stomach on the ground. The person treating him steps astride, places his open hands on either side of the patients lower ribs, and exerts firm, but not violent pressure. This may be done by allowing the weight of the body to come on the arms. After exert ing this pressure for three seconds the persons administering treatment raises his body and relaxes the. pressure. The is repeated at intervals of five seconds, or twelve times in q minute.
 Sometimes the pressure on the chest used in artificial respiration may have a direct effect on the heart and stop the twitching already mentioned.
 In his discussion Dr. Drinker is care full to warn against two methods of treatment which are frequently tried without success. The first of these is the injection directly into the heart of various drugs, such as adrenalin, of which newspapers have said much dur ing the past year. These injections seem to give no promise of influencing the results in the care of patients with electric shock. The second method, which should certainly be discounten- anced, is the giving of another or counter-shock. The idea that a may be helpful seems to have arisen as the result of the ob- servation that men who are seriously shocked while at the top of telephone pole, and then fall, are more apt to revive than those who are shocked while on the ground, On the basis of