[Cardiac arrest in severe acute respiratory syndrome: analysis of 15 cases]

To investigate the causes for cardiac arrest in severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) patients.

Retrospective analysis of the epidemiological history, clinical presentation, the change of laboratory tests, chest radiography, and treatment of 15 SARS patients with cardiac arrest.

The average age of the patients was 60 years. Eight had a history of exposure to SARS patients, among them 6 were household contacts. Eight patients had no underlying diseases, and another 8 complained of extreme anxiety. Abnormalities of cardiac enzymes were present in 10 patients. Myocardial ischemia and arrhythmia were present in 5 patients. Bilateral, multifocal lung infiltrates were present in 13 of the 15 patients. Four patients died after defecation and 9 died during relatively stable periods.

It was suggested that the causes for cardiac arrest in SARS patients may include: (1) the lung injury caused by the SARS virus leads to hypoxemia and thus an unsteady state of the myocardial electricity; (2) SARS virus directly causes injury to the myocardial cells and/or the conduct system; (3) SARS infection aggravates the original myocardial pathological change, worsening the conduct block; (4) extreme anxiety leads to extra secretion of catecholamine, which causes instability of myocardial electricity; (5) defecation worsens hypoxemia, which induces arrhythmia (ventricular fibrillation) and causes cardiac arrest.