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I watched 24 hours in A&E last night and was both interested and disturbed by the questions being asked by one particular patient.
Scarlett, an11 year old girl who had been admitted with a head injury. She asked the doctor if she was going to die of a heart attack. Obviously she was agitated and frightened of her surroundings but it struck me as a very strange question from an 11 year old.
Could it be that the greater publicity of deaths from sudden cardiac arrest and the proliferation of defibrillators (AEDs)in schools and, shopping centres etc.is creating a generation of kids that have sudden death anxiety?
When I was 11, I didn't know what a heart attack was. Today, kids are being taught about ventricular fibrillation,cardiac arrest and successful outcomes from early intervention with CPR and and AED. Is education about a relatively rare medical event compromising the mental well being and happiness of a large number of youngsters?
Perhaps even deterring them from playing rugby, netball or swimming for fear of "falling ill."
Your thoughts
Your thoughts
you think too much.
I think as time passes we all learn things from an earlier age as there is a better understanding, just progression. But, like my missus, you is thinking too much 🙂
Mate's super-fit dad died from an arrest very suddenly playing rugby (about 200 yards from where I am sat right now 🙁 ) when we were 8 or 9, so mid 1980's. I wonder if he could have been saved like SFB by people at the scene being better informed/trained and any/better CPR, or indeed a passing police car with an AED in it.
Personally I believe people will always worry about something, and cardiac arrests and vinny jones doing CPR will be displaced by some other worries in time, just as some other worries were probably displaced by this one. And fear/panic about sudden death is not uncommon in head injuries/concussion.
In fact an unexplainable fear of impending doom is sometimes an early indicator of myocardial infarction, so you could argue that people being better educated about this might seek help earlier and be in a safer place when they do arrest.
The word heart attack is used pretty liberally always has been she may have heard of the word being used by a family member or friend talking about someone saying the died of a "Heart Attack".
My OH had almost exactly those thoughts when we watched it last night. We wondered if maybe she had experienced heart issues earlier in her life or at birth which may also explain her agitation of being in hospital (aside from a big whack on the head)
In fact an unexplainable fear of impending doom is sometimes an early indicator of myocardial infarction
You soon learn that is bollocks as we pick people up with the most minor of injuries and illness who think they are going to die.
My thought would be that she associates hospitals in general with some earlier event where a relative had a heart attack and died. Kids don't know which people are at risk from heart attacks.
Most kids dont think like that at least I didnt. I was perfectly capable of taking on the idea that bad things happen with out over reacting mainly cos I was nt that interested to be honest.
I suspect that she was panicking, she was very agitated. She could feel her heart beating more heavily and rapidly than normal and focused on it as being 'a problem' hence her repeated requests.
Her Mum didn't seem to be doing a brilliant job of trying to calm her down, tbh.
You soon learn that is bollocks as we pick people up with the most minor of injuries and illness who think they are going to die.
I'll be sure to correct our ILS trainer next time I see him. 😆
We are also trained that the quietest casualties (if you have a chioce of several! -only happened once to me and I wasn't at work either) are the ones to worry most about, so lord knows what to do....
I'll be sure to correct our ILS trainer next time I see him.
24 years of working frontline I've seen more feared about dying about minor stuff than MIs.
We are also trained that the quietest casualties
This part is true.
Could it be that the greater publicity of deaths from sudden cardiac arrest and the proliferation of defibrillators (AEDs)in schools and, shopping centres etc.is creating a generation of kids that have sudden death anxiety?When I was 11, I didn't know what a heart attack was. Today, kids are being taught about ventricular fibrillation,cardiac arrest and successful outcomes from early intervention with CPR and and AED. Is education about a relatively rare medical event compromising the mental well being and happiness of a large number of youngsters?
Perhaps even deterring them from playing rugby, netball or swimming for fear of "falling ill."
I have been working with a school in the North West who have been raising money for defibs for 5 schools in the area, they did so in response to a child suffering from a SCA nearby.
I'm really pleased the school made that decision to buy them and that they are going to be educating the staff and students about what they do and how they help save lives in certain situations.
I'm not sure it causes anxiety if the training and explanations are done correctly, but can understand that there is still a slight fear and degree of ignorance about how and what AED's do.
I still get GP's who refuse to have them based on fear of being sued for using them 🙄
The phrase 'heart attack' is so widely used in all sorts of contexts (oh you almost gave me a heart attack!) that kids are bound to ask what it is, and they get told it's where your heart stops working properly and you might die.
So I would not be at all surprised to hear a kid ask a question like that.
Re people falling dead - my Mum was a PE teacher and someone collapsed on her hockey field once. Also during my school days but at a different school someone had an epileptic fit, a stroke and a heart attack all at the same time whilst playing hockey. Survived though apparently!
Oh and there was my sister's mate who fell down dead as she was talking to him, in 6th form college. That was tough.
All work places should have auto defibs, hopefully the ones being bought by schools will save teachers lives as well.
However, the OP has raised a valid point.
I suppose you can't have one without the other. The device and the training for a layman to potentially save a life on one hand. The chance that kids may sit and fret about it happening to them and having the AED used on them on the other.
My 4 yr old said yesterday that she didn't want me to die in the war (they had been told about the wars because of Remembrance Sunday).
It's just stuff kids pick up isn't it.
Jnr FD was ill in hospital a few weeks back, on a general Paeds ward, I was talking to a Mother and we were doing the polite, what you here for thing.
She was in with her son who had been playing at school when he just keeled over having a heart attack. Apparently had CPR etc. He was only 8!
My daughter learned about cancer recently and she's obsessed with it. Every time someone gets ill or she hears of someone falling ill or dying she always asks if its cancer. I don't see why a 7 year old had to learn about cancer at that age or stage in her life. I wouldn't say she's scared or anxious about it but it had obviously affected her. A far cry from the things I was worrying about when I was 7 like where my Luke Skywalker in flight gear figure was, or if my wind up evil kinevil bike would make the next jump I was planning for it. Kids seem to be denied a childhood these days. It's sad.
We are also trained that the quietest casualties are the ones to worry most about
Which is completely standard practice, and I'm not sure why it should be surprising if you think about it. Much like with drowning where victims don't generally splash about and shout in the way they're supposed to.
My only direct experience with MI is some chap having one in the middle of a swimming pool when I was lifeguarding for a sponsored swim. I wasn't involved directly in the CPR but in very close proximity (I helped lift him out of the pool). Sadly he didn't make it, despite probably getting better and faster treatment than if it had happened anywhere else - oh and I remember he wasn't that old and seemed fairly fit.
When I was a kid I used to worry about a nuclear winter.
Kids have to confront all sorts of illnesses at all sorts of ages as relatives become ill and die. Better that the mechanics of what happens are properly and appropriately explained to them than someone trots out the 'Nanna's gone to heaven' line which leaves more questions than answers.
Kids seem to be denied a childhood these days. It's sad.
Except that's bollocks.
When I was a kid like MuppetWrangler it was Surviving the Nuclear holocaust and if that wasn't going to get you the AIDS would. And you had to give your pocket money to Ethiopia.
Kids hear and pick up on different things and become slightly obsessed by them even though they don't understand them.
[i]Kids hear and pick up on different things and become slightly obsessed by them even though they don't understand them. [/i]
I've avoided mentioning 650B to my children for this very reason.
I don't see why a 7 year old had to learn about cancer at that age or stage in her life
Why not? She needs to learn that people die. Of what is not particularly important is it?
You don't have to go into all the gory details of course.