Just a thought....

So now I have a pacemaker... Wont let my heartrate fall below 60BPM. What happens if I die from some other type of problem? like extended liverfits or extreme stupidity.(Just plausable examples) Will my pacemaker keep my heart beating after everything else is technically dead?? What happens if the pacemaker keeps going and brings me BACK after I'm buried or on the way into the crematorium? YIKES!!! If some other thing kills me (drowning or car wreck) will they have sense enough to shut the durned pacemaker off??? I'd hate to wake up in a little box underground and the pacemaker is keeping me going till I starve or suffocate..Ah the DOWN side of pacing.. Geez I hope I dont break my neck and they cant see me wink my eyes.... HOLY COW!

8 Comments

Smitty

by wenditt - 2009-12-28 11:12:18

What a way to put it into perspective Smitty! LOL....love the bell idea!

Witty Smitty....too funny!

More On Your Thought

by SMITTY - 2009-12-28 11:12:39

Hey Roadbiker,

This is a subject that comes up here from time to time and very simply put, a pacemaker will not keep a person from dieing. I put this question to a tech doing a checkup for me one day and his reply was, "I know this is crude, but dead meat won't beat."

While your pacemaker may keep sending electrical impulses to your heart trying to make the heart chambers contract, contraction cannot occur although those impulses may be detectable by some electronic instruments such as an EKG. Even if you could get heart chamber contraction, unless the lungs are functioning and providing oxygenated blood for the heart to pump, the heart and brain, nor any other organ, can continue to live.

As for your question of "What happens if the pacemaker keeps going and brings me BACK after I'm buried or on the way into the crematorium?" Just put in your medical directive that you want a bell attached to a string on your finger and the bell hung outside of the container your are in. That way you can be a "bell ringer" if a mistake has been made. That is the way it was done back in the days before embalming or reliable methods of being sure death had occurred and gave us the term "bell ringer." Someone would keep watch for some amount of time just in case the bell should start ringing.

Smitty

I Am Not Wasting My Time nor Monies ~ ~ ~

by Carolyn65 - 2009-12-29 03:12:17

Since I have read about this many times on the PM Club site, I wondered myself what directive I might want on this lil' energizer bunny I own, paid for and wear 24/7. After a pre-op nurse wanted to show me a "sample" of a PM, I was able to pick one up and "play" with it for a few minutes, turning it over and around and upside down. As light as that "sample PM" was and as shiny silver, I personally want my PM shined, a coupla diamond "studs" or diamond tear drops implanted on the shiny silver surface of my PM and have it where the "top" can open like a pendant and have pics. of myself watching over everyone when the "pendant" is opened. "I Was Here" ~ ~

The new piece of "jewelry" will most definitely be the most expensive necklace anyone will be wearing, due to the cost of the original use of the "new necklace".

Now, I just have to find the "right" person for the "new necklace".

Carolyn G. in TEXAS UT LONGHORNS 1/7/10

Get cremated & they

by janetinak - 2009-12-29 04:12:41

will take PM out 1st as it explodes is my understanding. Least that's my plan. Of course you can always get the bell & the string & a GOOD friend to watch for a day or so like Smitty relates they did in the olden days. Personally I prefer my method.

Good luck & lets all hope we have a lot of good years to think about this before the time comes.

Happy New Year!

Janet

Won't need the bell

by lenora - 2009-12-29 12:12:06

If you should happen to get dispatched to the Great Beyond out on the road somewhere, the mortuary turns off the pacer. Now if you're a patient in my cardiac unit we have a big magnet the cardiologist places over the pacer for 5 minutes to stop or inhibit pacing. If you have been pronounced brain and cardiacally (just invented a new word) dead, personally I don't WANT you to come out of that box!!

I'm speechless

by ElectricFrank - 2009-12-29 12:12:37

Smitty said it well!!!!

frank

exploding pacemakers

by Mitch - 2009-12-29 12:12:58

I owned a crematorium for many years and we always had the pacemakers removed prior to cremation for that reason. One day I decided to find out if it was true so I placed a removed pm in the retort and fired it up. No explosion. It did pop open but I would equate the explosion with a very small fire cracker. has anyone else had any experience with this?

Magnet & Exploding PM

by hrtfl88 - 2010-01-12 01:01:58

Thanks to roadbiker and Carolyn65 for some laughs. I count myself as a bionic woman and grateful to have technology on my side.

I've asked and been told that a magnet is used to stop the pacing and that pacers are removed before cremation. I'm happy someone did not shrug off my questions but answered without trying to be funny as death questions are Serious.

You know you're wired when...

The mortgage on your device is more than your house.

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