Dead mans' heartbeat ...(pearoast)
I was mentoring a new student paramedic and we were sent to a patient in cardiac arrest.
The patients' rigor mortis was a sure fire clue that he was indeed very dead so needless to say there was little for us to do but wait for the police to arrive.

The student asks me what procedure do we follow if there was no rigor mortis or if we wanted to stop resuscitation etc.
I explained to him that one of the criteria is to connect the patient to the heart monitor / defibrillator and check that asystole (flatline) is present in two or more leads.
We were still waiting for the police and as it was the student’s first cardiac arrest I connected the deceased to the monitor as described and switched it on.
"Beep…beep…beep…" the unmistakable sound of a heartbeat coming though the monitor.
I nearly nearly shat myself and had a cardiac arrest until I realized that the monitor had detected the deceased’s still functioning internal pacemaker….
(emadex thinks the world will end on, Wed 5 Mar 2008, 11:27, 1 reply)

Isn't that the worst feeling?
The first guy I pronounced, I was so nervous I had my thumb over the bell end (yes, that's what it's called, stop snickering) of my stethescope and heard my own pounding heartbeat instead of the [dead] silence I expected. I must have had an "Oh fuck, fuck, fuckity, fuckwad, fuckfuckfuckfuuuuuck!" look on my face, for the nurse training me calmly moved my thumb a centimeter and smiled at me.
And of course this was in front of the sorrowing family all watching me intently, hoping I'll say he's still alive.
(TDub Nunc id vides, nunc ne vides on, Thu 6 Mar 2008, 5:01, closed)