and if the hearts is struck, basically, at the wrong millisecond. in the usual cycle of these electrical impulses. it can cause a catastrophic arrhythmia called a trivial formulation. and that would take about six seconds to figure out. and when you look at the tape, mr. hamlin made the tackle. got hit in the chest. got it right over the heart. that was the blow. he got a 0.2 seconds later, and wanted to second federica laps. that s along a takes few to pass out after your heart formulates. but what does that mean? i m pack that term for us. ventricular fibrillation. what does that mean? the heartbeats in a coordinated fashion the heart fibrillator s when the ventricle, the big thick pumping chamber of the heart regulates. and instead of squeezing rick
chamber part of the heart, responsible for pumping out that oxygenated blood during the heartbeat you get this stun and then the heart becomes this uncoordinated frenzy of electrical activity. what we call ventricular fibrillation unfortunately leads to sudden cardiac arrest. it s no longer beating in organized fashion anymore. there were those critical moments of cpr on the field. i think 16 minutes before in the ambulance and on the way to the hospital. do most people make it out of this? you know, poppy what we are seeing is a slow improvement in those who live through this type of event. we hear anywhere from about 15 to just below 30 of these events happening that unfortunately lead to death. what is so critical, and when we do see about 58% of people surviving, is that you get immediate cpr, and that person has access to an aed.
way. and that causes the heart to go into this abnormal heart rhythm known at ventricular fibrillation nap wasn t known at t the time. i m a brain guy but you suspect a brain or spinal cord injury. giving he was standing up, then staggered and fell back made this less likely and a cardiac arrest more likely. we learned overnight, it was in fact cardiac arrest and also critically important they were able to start, restart his heart on the field. we couldn t tell that last night. we know they had started cpr. the goal of cpr is essentially take over what the heart should be doing. the heart should be pumping oxygen and blood throughout the body. it s not doing that. essentially through your own hands you re forcing the heart to essentially pump thatblood, chambers, pump that oxygenated
with us. we have received official word now from the buffalo bills that damar hamlin suffered a cardiac arrest following a hit in the game and his heartbeat was restored on the field before being transferred to the hospital where he is currently sedated and in critical condition. what does all this reveal to you? well, it reveals that we re onto the right diagnosis. when you have traumatic chest injury at a specific time during the heart s repolarization during the time when a heartbeat is getting ready to beat again. when you have a chest trauma at that time, this is what happens. you have this sudden cardiac arrest and the ventricular fibrillation or the squirming of the heart, it s all painting a picture now. remember hindsight s always 20/20. these professionals there at the game didn t have access to a video camera like we do watching this play over and over again. they had seconds. they had seconds to respond and what we re finding out is that
essentially acting as a projectile? like i showed in that baseball graphic. is that the sort of moment of impact where basically you hit the heart and essentially cause that abnormal heart rhythm to begin? ventricular fibrillation. when i say it s rare, i m saying maybe a couple dozen time as year that this happens, and it s because the exact, the right, the exact spot at the exact time. i mean, the heart s beating constantly. you hit it at the exact time you could cause this sort of abnormality of the heart rhythm. again, doesn t happen often but seems to be wrapped there. i m looking for the fact he then stands up after that. stands up. which is really important. again, as a neurosurgeon, brain surgeon. i m thinking a brain injury? spinal cord injury? does not appear to be a the that point but at this point as you re watching when he