Medicine: Shocked Hearts

After giving nine years to the research, during which time he electrocuted 900 guinea pigs, twelve rabbits, ten cats, ten dogs, ten pigs. 500 sheep and ten calves, Livingston Polk Ferris. Bell Telephone Laboratories Engineer, last week in Electrical Engineering, was able to state precisely why a person may drop dead upon being shocked by a small current of electricity. Such an accident may happen when a person, still wet from a bath, touches an improperly grounded electric light in the bathroom. Mr. Ferris and associates rediscovered a method of reviving such shocked persons.

The killing current may be as small as two-tenths of an ampere if it is the 60-cycle alternating current common in most U. S. communities. One ampere is the minimum killing amperage of direct current which Mr. Ferris investigated. In all cases the voltage was relatively unimportant.

Those small currents kill by causing ventricular fibrillation. Normally the fibres of the muscle of the heart contract and relax in perfect rhythm, like a complex machine whose parts are all working in unison. In fibrillation the muscle fibres start to flutter independently of each other, thus stopping the heart's organized pulsations. This condition in electric shock, according to Mr. Ferris, "results from an abnormal stimulation rather than from damage to the heart. In the fibrillating condition, the heart seems to quiver rather than to beat; no heart sounds can be heard with a stethoscope; the pumping action of the heart ceases; failure of circulation results in an asphyxial death within a few minutes. The medical profession long has recognized that ventricular fibrillation once set up in man is unlikely to cease naturally before death."

Mr. Ferris caused typical fibrillation in the seven species of animals with which he experimented by running various kinds and amounts of electricity between fore and hind legs. Thus he caused the currents to traverse the animals' hearts. He had no need to experiment with human beings after he learned that an average-sized pig matches a fat little man in body weight and heart weight; an average sheep matches heart and body of a medium-sized woman. Having discovered those facts, Mr. Ferris learned that a couple of French physiologists in 1899 had found that a strong electric shock will stop fibrillation and restart the heart on its regular beat. After verifying this, Mr. Ferris determined that "to be successful, a counter-shock must be administered promptly after the fibrillating shock, probably within a few minutes."