Word: fairman
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Built-in for Permanence? Even Fairman's compact and ingenious device is not the ultimate, say medical researchers...
...Fairman is one of a small but growing group of U.S. heart patients who have been wired for living with a variety of pacemakers that are alike in principle but differ in detail. When a diseased heart stops or goes into fibrillation (a useless twitching and fluttering), it can often be restored to normal beat by a single electric shock. In more stubborn cases, small electrical impulses must be transmitted to the heart at a near normal pulse rate (60 to 72 per minute...
...Fairman's case, the doctors did not dare open the chest to sew the electrode into the heart muscle because they doubted that the patient would survive surgery...
...they decided on the direct-puncture method. With only a local anesthetic, the job took ten minutes. Surgeon Erwin Jennings, 38, put the king-sized needle between Fairman's fourth and fifth ribs, aimed for the right ventricle. Jennings knew when he had hit it, because electrical impulses from Fairman's heart were transmitted through the wire. A fishhook type of barb on the end of the wire set it in the heart muscle...
...Fairman's pacemaker, about the size of a pocket transistor radio, weighed only 12 oz., was powered by a 9.4-volt battery...