case study discussion 24

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A 60-year-old male patient is admitted with chest pain to the telemetry unit where you work. While having a bowel movement on the bedside commode, the patient becomes short of breath and diaphoretic. The ECG waveform shows bradycardia.

  • What other assessment findings should you anticipate?
  • Why does this patient probably have bradycardia?
  • Does this dysrhythmia need treatment? Why or why not? What intervention would you implement first?
  • What is the drug treatment and dosage of choice for symptomatic bradycardia? How does this drug increase heart rate?

Please use complete sentences to answer the questions. Ensure that you are using correct grammar. In additions, support your answers by using your textbooks, scholarly journals, and credible Internet sources. All citations must be in APA format.

Discussion – Artifact vs. Dysrhythmia

Describe the role of each component of the ECG in the heart’s contraction: the P wave, the PR interval, the QRS complex, the ST segment, the T wave, and the QT interval. What is the difference between artifact and dysrhythmia? How can you reduce artifacts? What are some situations that can occur if artifact is not reduced or eliminated?

You are working in the Telemetry Unit. The nurse “watching” the monitors is reading a magazine. She constantly turns off an alarm that looks a lot like Ventricular Fibrillation. She tells you that it is not a dysrhythmia, it is just artifact. What do you think about her actions? What is the worst case scenario in this situation? What would you do?