Talk:Precordial thump

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I think this article is too formal. I understand the need to keep people from trying this at home, but would it be possible to just quickly tell what it is at the beginning, before twice explaining about various professions? --Apoc2400 (talk) 22:08, 30 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Removed "once" as healthcare professionals still use this procedure as outlined in this article

I took out the "once" from the first line. Adding "once" or "used to" is someone saying "medical school taught me that laymen aren't supposed to perform this procedure." I personally know doctors who have used this on patients recently and saved lives in the absence of an AED. If there are sources indicating that the treatment is obsolete and not a viable option, someone needs to cite them and the article needs to be rewritten. Shiggity (talk) 23:13, 7 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Complete rewrite

This article was clearly written from the ground up by a light-duty LPN or an EMT-Basic who just parroted what they were told in junior college. I've rewritten it with links to statements by modern emergency professionals.

The precordial thump is absolutely still used, including by non-medical professionals, and the degree of effectiveness is basically the same regardless of who's doing it. It's not an arcane, specialized procedure; using the base of your fist, you hit the sternum with the same level of force that would be required to get a stationary basketball to bounce upwards so you could start dribbling it. If it's done in the first 5 seconds of arrest, it will restore sinus in around a quarter of the cases. The other 75% of the time it does nothing, so you continue with your CPR.

The problem isn't that it's difficult to do, and the problem isn't that it's not effective some of the time. 60% of sudden cardiac arrests are witnessed, so it should work fine in a good number of those cases if the civilians knew what to do. The problem is idiot-proofing it. CPR also breaks ribs and sternums, but it's repetitive, has only two steps, and is easy to remember. When the thump was still taught in CPR, too many civilians would sit there and pound on the guy's chest like Hawkeye Pierce when they should have thumped once and then gone to CPR while somebody else ran for the nearest AED.

The idea that NO civilian is ever capable of performing it is simple arrogance by certain elements of the medical community who insist on believing that civilians are all drooling semi-morons who will surely kill each other if given any kind of instruction beyond "Push here and yell for a grown up". Court Appointed Shrub (talk) 18:50, 23 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

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