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Home Defibrillators Found Medically Useless in Saving Lives 10-21-08
by: David Gutierrez
Expensive home defibrillator machines do not improve heart attack patients'
chances of survival, according to a study conducted by researchers from the
Seattle Institute for Cardiac Research, presented at the annual meeting of the
American College of Cardiology in Chicago and published in the New England
Journal of Medicine.
Researchers followed 7,001 heart attack survivors for 37 months, placing
defibrillators into the homes of half of them and instructing the other half to
call 911 or other emergency medical assistance if they experienced another heart
attack. None of the participants had been considered suitable for implantation
with defibrillators.
Defibrillators are devices that use an electrical current to restart a failing
heart. The home defibrillators used in the study were identical to those found
in many public locations.
Overall, only 450 of the heart attack patients had died after 37 months. The
survival rate among the defibrillator group was not significantly different than
the rate among the other group.
"It really amazed me that the survival prospects for this group were so
promising," said lead researcher Gust H. Bardy. "A 2 percent-a-year death rate
for 60-year-old patients, that surprises me."
Bardy noted that the defibrillators did not fail to work as advertised; they
simply did not end up being needed most of the time.
"It's not that the devices are ineffective," he said. "When they were used, they
did real well."
The devices were used only 18 times, and in six cases were successful in saving
the patient's life.
In an accompanying editorial, David J. Callans of the University of Pennsylvania
said that home use of defibrillators should not be encouraged, largely due to
the fact that they are so expensive.
"Future efforts should turn toward education, modification of risk factors and
other methods for primary prevention of heart disease," he said.