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Definition
By Mayo Clinic staffVentricular fibrillation occurs when the heart beats with rapid, erratic electrical impulses. This causes pumping chambers in your heart (the ventricles) to quiver uselessly, instead of pumping blood. During ventricular fibrillation, your blood pressure plummets, cutting off blood supply to your vital organs.
Ventricular fibrillation is an emergency that requires immediate medical attention. A person with ventricular fibrillation will collapse within seconds and soon won't be breathing or have a pulse. Emergency treatment for ventricular fibrillation includes cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and shocks to the heart with a device called a defibrillator.
Treatments for those at risk of ventricular fibrillation include medications and implantable devices that can restore a normal heart rhythm.
- Ventricular fibrillation. American Heart Association. http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4784. Accessed Aug. 11, 2009.
- Olgin JE, et al. Specific arrhythmias: Diagnosis and treatment. In: Libby P. Braunwald's Heart Disease: A Textbook of Cardiovascular Medicine. 8th ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Saunders Elsevier; 2007. http://www.mdconsult.com/book/player/book.do?method=display&type=bookPage&decorator=header&eid=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-4106-1..50067-4&uniq=151686941&isbn=978-1-4160-4106-1&sid=867495152#lpState=open&lpTab=contentsTab&content=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-4106-1..X5001-8--TOP%3Bfrom%3Dcontent%3Bisbn%3D978-1-4160-4106-1%3Btype%3DbookHome. Accessed Sept. 11, 2009.
- ACC/AHA/ESC 2006 guidelines for management of patients with ventricular arrhythmias: A prevention of sudden cardiac death — Executive summary. Circulation. 2008;117:e350.
- Srivathsan K, et al. Ventricular tachycardia and ventricular fibrillation. Expert Reviews in Cardiovascular Therapy. 2009;7:801.
- What is an automated external defibrillator? American Heart Association. http://www.americanheart.org/downloadable/heart/112082979566711%20ABH%20WhtIsAutomatedExtrnlDefib.pdf. Accessed April 30, 2009.
