Morbid Question: Death pronouncements for those with pacemakers?

[darkstar]

Sorry in advance if this brings up bad memories for some.

But does the pacemaker have to receive some degree of electrical impulse from brain in order to function?

In cases of patients near death, do they turn them off a bit in advance? (Maybe more of a moribund question, in that case?)

Sorry about my general ignorance on this.

[greatauntoftriplets]

1. No, they keep on ticking after death.

My mother had a pacemaker. She flatlined on respiration, but the pacemaker kept on ticking. It was a bit weird and disconcerting.

[darkstar]

2. Oh man...sorry to hear this...

It does sound *very* disconcerting. That's what I was wondering about, however. Thanks for responding and educating me.

:hug:

[greatauntoftriplets]

4. No problem....

My mother died a week short of her 94th birthday. She had lived a good life.

We were all there with her, not the triplets, of course, they were just 5 and pissed off that they could not visit great-grandma.

Best of luck to whoever is in this condition that you care about.

I put my mother into a hospice program the morning of the day she died. They did great. Sent a clergyman to be with us when she died (it was a Jewish rabbi, though the family is Catholic) but he was great and we appreciated his presence and his ecumenical prayers.

Just to be clear, I was a change-of-life baby. I HATE being thought of as somebody who could be in her 70s, according to when my mother was born.

:shrug:

[darkstar]

6. Thanks for the good thoughts.

Plus, I accidentally learned who your avatar was--after a long time of wondering--the other day when looking up "Bobby Sands" after being reminded of him. What a story. Seems that image is one of the few/most famous of him.

Thanks again.

:hi:

[supernova]

3. Yes, they're like batteries

for your heart.

[greatauntoftriplets]

5. Exactly....

Pacemakers are really remarkable machines.

[Beausoir]

7. When my mother was near death, we had her defibrillator turned off. Tough decision.

A tech came out and just waved some kind of device over her implant and it shut down.
We knew her time was nearly up and did not want her receiving a jolt to the heart as she died.