ACTOR Michael Madsen passed away at 67 after suffering a cardiac arrest.
Known for his roles in Quentin Tarantino movies Kill Bill and Reservoir Dogs, he was found unresponsive in his home on Thursday morning.
Michael Madsen has passed away at the age of 67 from a cardiac arrest[/caption]
He’s know for appearing in Quentin Tarrantino films like Kill Bill[/caption]
The actor was found unresponsive in his home on July 3[/caption]
The Los Angeles County sheriff’s department said Micheal had died of natural causes, according to NBC News.
His manager, Ron Smith, said the actor had suffered a cardiac arrest – when the heart suddenly stops pumping blood around the body.
The medical emergency usually strikes without warning, causing people to collapse, fall unconscious or stop breathing.
Cardiac arrests are different to heart attacks — where the blood supply to the organ is cut off.
They are caused by abnormal heart rhythms when the body’s electrical system isn’t working properly.
Some heart rhythms can mean the organ can’t pump blood around the body.
One example is ventricular fibrillation, when the heart quivers or ‘fibrillates’ instead of pumps.
Meanwhile, common arrhythmias like atrial fibrillation aren’t life-threatening, but they cause irregular, fast heart rhythms.
Cardiac arrest can also be cause by heart valve or muscle disease, as a well as a heart attack or a severe haemorrhage.
A person can die within minutes from a cardiac arrest unless they are immediately given CPR and medical treatment.
They affect around 30,000 Brits a year outside of hospital, according to the British Heart Foundation, killing more than 90 per cent.
According to research, there are some signs of the medical emergency you can spot before it occurs.
Dr Kyndaron Reinier, of the Cedars-Sinai Health System in Los Angeles, said: “Warning symptoms hold promise for predicting an imminent sudden cardiac arrest.”
Around half of patients have symptoms in “the hours, days, or weeks before their cardiac arrest”, she said.
Michael appeared to have died from natural causes[/caption]
The actor in Quentin Tarantino’s directorial debut, Reservoir Dogs[/caption]
Pictured with Tarantino and his Kill Bill cast mates[/caption]
Her study, published in the Lancet, looked at how common symptoms were in cardiac arrest patients and a control group of non-cardiac arrest patients who also called emergency services.
Researchers studied more than 1,500 adults in the US to see if any could indicate an attack was about to happen.
They identified four key symptoms.
1. Shortness of breath
The most common early sign of a cardiac arrest was shortness of breath — known medically as dyspnoea.
Some 41 per cent of cardiac arrest patients suffered the sign before the health emergency, compared to 22 per cent in the control group.
It was the only sign to be significantly linked to cardiac arrests in both men and women, researchers said.
How to respond to cardiac arrest
A cardiac arrest is an emergency.
If you’re with someone who’s having a cardiac arrest, call 999, start CPR and use a defibrillator if there’s one nearby.
Follow instructions from the 999 operator until emergency services take over.
Starting immediate CPR is vital as it keeps blood and oxygen moving to the brain and around the body.
A defibrillator will then deliver a controlled electric shock to try and get the heart beating normally again.
Public access defibrillators are often in places like train stations and shopping centres.
Anyone can use one and you don’t need training to do so.
2. Chest pain
Chest pain was the second most common sign.
It affected around a third of cardiac arrest patients, compared to a quarter of the control group.
However, it was only significantly linked to cardiac arrests in men — not women.
3. Sweating
Diaphoresis — or heavy sweating — also affected cardiac arrest patients in the days before their heart stopped beating.
Around 12 per cent had the symptom, compared to eight per cent in the control group.
It was also only significantly linked in men, not women.
4. Seizures
Finally, “seizure-like activity” was also more common in cardiac patients than the control group.
Eleven per cent had the symptom, compared to seven per cent.
Nausea or vomiting, weakness, dizziness, and abdominal symptoms were all more common in the control group.
“Our findings represent the initial step in the discovery of novel methods to predict imminent sudden cardiac arrest,” researchers said.
“Although warning symptoms can potentially be harnessed, many people have these symptoms on a daily basis,” they added.
“Warning symptoms are common but might need to be supplemented with additional features, such as the clinical profile and biometric measures, for improved prediction of imminent sudden cardiac arrest.”
