Read about the latest news on ECG / EKG Machines

Most adults over the age of 45 will undergo a series of heart screenings as part of an annual checkup. Testing may require the use of an EKG machine, but it may or may not include the use of an exercise stress test. In many cases, patients are not asked to take a stress test unless they have had symptoms of heart disease.

A stress test is one where a doctor learns how well the heart responds to exercise, and it is an essential part of a comprehensive cardiac exam. Patients are asked to walk on a treadmill while hooked up to an EKG machine. As the body starts working harder throughout the test, it also requires more oxygen. This means the heart will need to pump more blood. An exercise stress test will show if the blood supply in the arteries that lead to the heart is sufficient. It can also help determine how much exercise is appropriate for the patient.

Here is how a stress test works:

* The patient is first hooked up the electrical leads of an EKG machine
* Then, they are asked to walk in place slowly while on a treadmill
* The speed of the treadmill increases and the crossramp is tilted to simulate the effect of walking uphill
* Some patients may be asked to breath into a tube periodically during the test
* Immediately afterward, the patient is asked to lie down for a blood pressure check
* The doctor assesses the patient’s heart rate, breathing, EKG results and blood pressure, as well as the level of fatigue the patient feels during the test.

Using a stress test, doctors can determine the presence of coronary artery disease and predict the patient’s risk for a heart attack, among other things. If the results of the test are worrisome, the doctor may order additional tests, such as a nuclear stress test.

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Each year in the United States, many children fall victim to cardiac arrest. In fact about 7,000 young people in America die from this preventable disease every year.

When a doctor uses EKG Machines to test patients it can serve as a valuable alert that something is wrong, but children are rarely tested on such devices. In many cases, a simple EKG screening could have saved their lives.

Doctors are challenged with the task of predicting heart disease among adults, even when they have a lot of symptoms. But sadly, when it comes to children, often the first visible symptom of heart problems is a serious or fatal collapse.

While some coronary artery abnormalities cannot be found using an EKG machine, the truth is that the most common fatal heart problem of young people – cardiomyopathy – is easy to spot. Using EKG Machines can significantly decreases the number of heart-related deaths among our youth. Even testing for such problems as heart arrhythmia can be the difference between life and death in many cases.

A new push to implement EKG testing among 6 to 18-year-olds is being championed by many nationally known organizations. These include the Cardiac Arrhythmia Syndromes Foundation (CAS) and the American Heart Association and many pediatric health advocates across the nation.

With so many young people dying needlessly from preventable heart conditions, many parents are opting to have their children screened. When a simple test can be administered using EKG Machines at a local hospital or doctor’s office, parents should consider making this potentially life-changing decision to get children screened early and often.

When most people think of EKG machines, they picture adults and elderly patients hooked up to a machine with twelve leads and a graphing screen. It is not often that a child undergoes cardiac testing on such a machine, but the idea of doing EKG testing in schools is starting to sound like a smart idea

While most parents will allow their children to be tested in school, many of them don’t know that the medical community remains divided over the use of EKG screenings on kids. The reasons for their concerns include the expense; the potential for false-positive and false negative readings, and the logistics of conducting the tests.

The American Heart Association does not oppose voluntary EKG screening; however it does not recommend that the tests become mandatory. This may be due to the relative inaccuracy of the results. For example, one cardiologist involved in the study of EKG machines results on children was very much involved in offering testing to school students. After seeing many children with life-threatening heart conditions appear perfectly normal during an EKG, it is easy for one to become skeptical.

Doctors often worry that they may have been missing something in the test, especially when they know that EKG machines will not detect anomalies in the coronary arteries (which happens to be the second-leading cause of death among teenage athletes). However, an EKG machine will be very helpful in detecting the number one cause of death among young athletes, a condition known as cardiomyopathy.

As with any childhood illness, heart disease can begin at any time, so if an EKG screening is done on a child, it doesn’t mean they are cleared from that disease for life.

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