Asystole
Asystole is a topic covered in the 5-Minute Emergency Consult.
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Basics
Description
Description
Absence of ventricular electrical activity
Etiology
Etiology
- An end-stage rhythm, sometimes degrading from:
- Prolonged bradycardia
- Prolonged ventricular fibrillation (VF)
- Prolonged pulseless electrical activity
- Patient is extremely unlikely to survive when asystole occurs outside the hospital:
- ∼40% will have return of spontaneous circulation and survive to hospital admission, but <15% survive to hospital discharge.
- Prognosis is similarly poor for those patients who develop asystole after countershock for ventricular tachycardia/VF; <10% survive to hospital discharge.
- Potentially reversible causes include:
- Hypoxia
- Hypovolemia (blood loss)
- Acidosis
- Hyperkalemia
- Hypokalemia
- Drug overdose
- Hypothermia
- Pulmonary embolism
- Myocardial infarction
- Tension pneumothorax
- Cardiac tamponade
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Citation
Rosen, Peter, et al., editors. "Asystole." 5-Minute Emergency Consult, 5th ed., Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2016. Emergency Central, emergency.unboundmedicine.com/emergency/view/5-Minute_Emergency_Consult/307503/all/Asystole.
Asystole. In: Rosen P, Shayne P, Barkin AZ, et al, eds. 5-Minute Emergency Consult. 5th ed. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins; 2016. https://emergency.unboundmedicine.com/emergency/view/5-Minute_Emergency_Consult/307503/all/Asystole. Accessed December 9, 2019.
Asystole. (2016). In Rosen, P., Shayne, P., Barkin, A. Z., Wolfe, R. E., Hayden, S. R., Barkin, R. M., & Schaider, J. J. (Eds.), 5-Minute Emergency Consult. Available from https://emergency.unboundmedicine.com/emergency/view/5-Minute_Emergency_Consult/307503/all/Asystole
Asystole [Internet]. In: Rosen P, Shayne P, Barkin AZ, Wolfe RE, Hayden SR, Barkin RM, Schaider JJ, editors. 5-Minute Emergency Consult. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins; 2016. [cited 2019 December 09]. Available from: https://emergency.unboundmedicine.com/emergency/view/5-Minute_Emergency_Consult/307503/all/Asystole.
* Article titles in AMA citation format should be in sentence-case
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