Medical midnight musings
I’ve been doing some bi-lingual googling tonight, and now I am wondering…
Why is the general populace so badly informed on first aid measures concerning seizures?
The first thing anyone seems to know is that you have to put something into the patient’s mouth to prevent him/her biting off his/her tongue.
A colleague even named a piece of wood the recommended item.
Well, I hope in contrast a soft woven belt is harmless enough….
Turns out you’re not supposed to put anything into the patient’s mouth cos the risk of getting bitten or damaging the patient’s teeth is higher than the risk of any damage caused by the patient’s actually biting his/her tongue or cheek being truly serious.
Another oldie but goodie seems to be the advice to reach into the patient’s mouth and pull the tongue to the front, so that the patient cannot swollow it.
Apparently only recently this helpful “fact” got aired on Turkish tv for Germany.
One: The whole swallowing one’s tongue thing is a complete myth.
Two: Yeah, pull the tongue to the front, so that the patient surely cannot fail to bite on it.
Three: Hey, who needs fingers anyway; they’re way overrated.
It took me five seconds to google a comprehensive list of first aid measures, including what not to do.
Then why is the public knowledge (at least apparently in Germany and Turkey) on the level of the last century or so?
Witnessing a seizure is a scary, scary experience.
I’d be helpful if one at least had a real clue of what (not) to do.
January 24th, 2010 at 11:08 am
Um…
OK, the lack of useful (and the true wealth of false) information is strange and annoying. This is the century of the fruitbat, after all.
But why the sudden interest? Did anyone have a seizure? And if so, who?
January 24th, 2010 at 11:33 am
Indeed, a girl from your fair city had a seizure at the store this week.
Hence my bemoaning the persistent floating around of false theories.
January 24th, 2010 at 7:55 pm
I hope you didn’t ram a piece of wood down her throat while someone else tried to pull her tongue out…?
January 24th, 2010 at 8:05 pm
No, but after A. had managed to free the screaming mother’s finger (Following the equally bogous advice to reach into the mouth and press the tongue down, so it can’t be swallowed? I didn’t ask her afterwards why on earth she had put her finger there; I just told her to not forget in all the excitement and worry to have a doctor see to it later on.) we inserted my belt between the teeth…
January 24th, 2010 at 11:53 pm
At least your belt is soft.^^
January 25th, 2010 at 1:47 pm
Yup….
(And not as aware of what is happening to it as ppl’s fingers tend to be….)
January 25th, 2010 at 5:52 pm
LOL…
January 26th, 2010 at 4:40 pm
I think the swallowing tongue thing has floated around over here too. Bogus. Have you ever tried to swallow your tongue? Impossible, too short, and it’s attached…
No, the best thing to do is try to make sure the person doesn’t hurt him or herself by falling (if possible) and to keep any objects that may be harmful away. Depending on the cause of the seizure it should pass shortly, but the person may be disoriented for a while. If the seizure lasts for more than a few minutes then help should be called.
Apparently, given the mother’s reaction, this girl is not subject to seizures normally. If that’s the case, then she should be evaluated by a doctor to try to determine the cause.
January 26th, 2010 at 5:51 pm
Or the poor girl has seizures quite regularly - and Mom didn’t ask the family doctor if putting her finger into her daughter’s mouth was a good idea or not, because “any sensible person knows what to do if someone has a seizure”.
It’s just that until now she never was fast enough to insert her finger before her daughter’s mouth clamped shut.
January 26th, 2010 at 8:33 pm
@ Lynnette: Yeah, I read up on the topic now.
Concerning the tongue, well, some of the info sites stated that you should turn the person onto his/her side after the seizure, not just because vomiting might occur but also because the tongue could become lax and floppy in the aftermath and impede breathing.
But that’s after the seizure. During the seizure tongue swallowing is a myth and fingers and objects should stay out of the mouth, all sources, German and English, stated .
I didn’t hear all the mother was telling my colleague Ma., so I have to rely on her later saying that that was not the girl’s first seizure, but apparently the first one mom witnessed.
Luckily, the girl had already been sitting as she had said she was feeling sick (an “aura”, I now know), and when she suddenly twisted off the chair, her mother and Ma. caught her and laid her on the ground.
Over mom announcing “Oh my god” repeatedly, Ma. calmly stated that the girl was having a seizure, so while Ma. stripped off two of her sweaters to put under the girl’s head, I stepped over them and called an ambulance.
Later, the girl was indeed confused; not overly so, I’d say, but the paramedics would hear nothing of taking her to one of the closer hospitals and decreed she was going to the next bigger city with a university hospital.
Anyway, much as I tend to dislike a lot of my colleague Ma.’s ways, she was really great in that emergency. Not that she seemed to know everything (I read that it’s perfectly normal that ppl with seizures turn blue for a short while, which was a thing that worried her deeply while it occurred), but she stayed totally calm (at least outwardly) which was a real help.
She also had the sense to note how long the seizure took; well, I gotta say, two minutes rarely felt that long to me….
@ the Kitten: Tch, you evil person….
January 27th, 2010 at 9:18 am
The last time I saw a seizure, I was in the 2nd grade. A girl in my class went down and my teacher was holding her and crying. I didn’t even know what was going on. Heard a bit more later. I was worried that she was dying.
I knew a guy in college who told me he had experienced seizures, but he was taking some medication to prevent them. He didn’t have one for the year or so that I knew him.
I didn’t know about keeping objects out of the seizees mouth. I’ll remember that.
Just out of curiosity, who pays for the ambulance and paramedics in Germany? Does the patient get a bill? I was taken to the hospital by paramedics once about 11 years ago. I had to pay $300 for the trip to the hospital. For some reason, my health insurance didn’t cover it. They tried not to cover other stuff too! I hate America’s mess of a health care system!
January 27th, 2010 at 10:27 pm
Yeah, well, seizures do look somewhat as if the person is gonna die.
My other colleague, A. - who should get marks for removing the girl’s scarf and opening her jacket (”losen clothing to ease breathing”), not to mention that he was the one who managed to free the mother’s finger - later said that he had been terrified the girl was gonna die, with us not being able to do anything to help. If it had been a more tangible emergency, like rescuing someone from a fire or so he’d actually have felt better equipped to deal with it.
Hah, when I went to that college for 2 years there was this epileptic woman during 2nd year.
Once we went on a shopping trip to Münster, her, another girl and me.
And while we were having a snack at some café she suddenly stared off into space and stated “Oh, I forgot my meds today.” We thanked her profusely, for the forgetting as well as for the sharing, but we got lucky and she didn’t get any seizures.
She did get one though during that year in the bus on her way to college. As the connection between the city with the college and hers was so crappy, she had to wait for almost 2 hours for the next bus back home, which she chose to spend at the college rather than the bus station.
That woman looked like death warmed over all the time she was waiting for her trip back home…
Well, if you call an ambulance for a skinned knee they make you pay for it.
But if you call it for a good reason they do not.
At the store, this was the second time we called one.
First time was some years ago for a woman with blood pressure problems. She was feeling bad enough to want medical attention, and she was looking pale enough for us to agree she was probably right. They treated her on the spot and didn’t even take her with them, and no one got billed. They only sent 2 paramedics for that call though.
For last week’s they sent 5 ppl, 2 of ‘em doctors.
February 4th, 2010 at 11:50 am
In high school health class they taught me to put something sufficiently soft like a belt in their mouth to prevent damage to tongue or teeth if you could (and not to worry about it otherwise), and not to put your fingers in danger. They also said you have to turn the person on their side to prevent the tongue from obstructing breathing afterward.
I always wondered how well the whole belt/shirt thing would work in practice, but kept an “if it doesn’t help it can’t hurt either” attitude toward it (this obviously would not apply to harder materials, which would hurt). I feel cheated that whoever authored the high school textbook felt the need to hold on to an outdated piece of information just because they grew up with it (presumably). Oh well, now I know better.
February 5th, 2010 at 3:17 am
That’s what I found on the internet after reading this very postings. The truth is that the person will not swallow his tongue. He could clench his teeth down and bite it, but because it naturally rolls back slightly, this doesn’t often happen. There is a small piece of tissue behind the teeth and under the tongue called the frenulum linguae which keeps the tongue in place and prevents swallowing.
Thanks for sharing us this anyway!
February 6th, 2010 at 12:42 pm
http://pentra.blogspot.com/2010/02/hurt-locker-vs-avatar.html
February 6th, 2010 at 12:43 pm
Spamming is not good! M’kay?!
February 15th, 2010 at 11:48 pm
This reminds me:
we need a first aid kit around the house.
i got all sorts of hand/powertools around the house, i.e. things that at least, maim, if not kill.
and i don’t have a single roll of crepe bandage. clean rolls anyway.
nor sufficient bandaids, or other assorted such wossnames.
February 15th, 2010 at 11:50 pm
i’d heard of shoving your wallet in somebody’s mouth. don’t know how hygenic that is, still beats shoving fingers or other body parts down an epileptic’s wind pipe.
February 15th, 2010 at 11:53 pm
WHERE IS MY SECOND COMMENT!
I DEMAND MY LOST COMMENT IN WHICH I SPAKE OF SEKRIT KNOWLEDGE OF SHOVING WALLETS AND WOSSNAMES DOWN PEOPLE’S WINDPIPES INSTEAD OF FINGERS AND/OR OTHER BODY PARTS.
and yes, i am shouting at a blog engine. i should be off to bed.
March 6th, 2010 at 1:37 pm
THERE it is!
sometimes Kismet treats me bad. I’m not a spambot, you know.
sheesh. maybe i should switch to wordpress. blogger is too.. common, and haloscan just shut down. sheesh.
March 6th, 2010 at 8:34 pm
How’s the weather in Germany? Is it Spring there yet? Not quite Spring in Indiana, but getting close. I have seen some daffodil greens peeking through the fallen leaves.