HEART MACHINE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 15002, 25 May 1912, Page 2 (Supplement)

HEART MACHINE.

REDUCTION OP RAPID PULSATIONS. An electrical apparatus which will provide an effective imitation of the world-famous heart treatment at Nauheim (in Germany) has just been installed in the new electrotherapeutic department of Middlesex Hobpital, London. The apparatus is a simple adaptation of a high-power battery and induction coil with a metronome (a clockwork instrument for marking time) inserted in the second- j ary circuit. A metallic needle attached to the metronome dips into a little cup of mercury at each swing of the metronome's pendulum, and during contact the secondary circuit is completed so that a series of rapidly-interrupted currents passes through it. The apparatus is devised to convert large groups of muscles of the body or limbs into "secondary hearts" by causing them to contract and relax at intervals roughly corresponding tor the beats of the heart. " The has already been used in London with great succese in slowing and steadying the weak and over-rapid heartbeats of sufferers from chronic heart disease. Slower Heart-beats. Take a typical case* A mi die-aged woman had for some years been going to Nauheim for treatment for heart disease. The two terminals in the secondary circuit were placed over a large group of limb muscles, and the metronome was regulated so that the contraction and relaxation of this group caused by the passing current was some eight or ten beats per minute fewer than that of the heart. Within a few moments the heart's rate of beat slowed down until it became synchronous, or agreed, with the contraotion-rate of the muscle-group which was being stimulated. The theory of the treatment was explained by a member of the staff of the electrical department of the Middlesex Hospital, where the treatment is shortly to be put into operation. "Part of the stimulus which causes the heart to beat is derived from the pressure of the blood in the large veins entering into the heart. When the current passes into the group of muscles under treatment, these muscles forcibly contract and the blood is squeezed out of the large veins within them." Relief of Breathlessness. "These large veins have little valves at intervals throughout their length, 60 arranged that under pressure, as when the muscles contract, the blood can flow only in one direction, that is, towards the heart. When the metronome pendulum swings to the other aide, drawing the needle out of the mercury and so breaking the current, the group of muscles relaxes and the veins are refilled from the little branch veins and capillaries. The main vein from the part is therefore converted into what one might term a 'pulsating heart.' As a result, the heart in this way receives stimuli at a rate a little slower than its own rate of beat, and in a short time regulates its own rate so sb to synchronise with these stimuli."

Another very gratifying result noted in the treatment of "heart cases" by this method is a striking relief of the breathlessnees which is often so distressing to the patient. This slowing of the breathing rate is thought to be due to ths help the labouring heart receives in pumping the blood through the large vessels in the lungs.