Do people who get pacemakers or cochlear implants or organ transplants need counselling or is it just not a problem for most people?
It was implanted three days after the VF episode, and the doctor basically said "we don't know why the VF happened in your case, the ICD is your best option for staying alive in the future". The implantation procedure only involved a heavy local anaesthetic and wasn't unpleasant. Much, much less painful than the broken ribs from being CPR'd, which took a couple of months to heal. The ICD sits under the skin above below my left collar bone, and the shape is clearly visible. I ignore it on a day to day basis. Every year I go in for a device check and sometimes for a joke they make it buzz (like having a mobile phone on vibrate, under your skin). Hehe.
It's fired once, almost a year ago. I was on my own at the time, at home, and if it hadn't gone off, I'd be dead, again. So having it is a no-brainer, and I have never felt traumatised / horrified by it. What was / is harder to deal with is that every time it fires, I now face a two-year driving ban. I totally understand the reasoning here: when a VF episode happens I have perhaps 5 to 10 seconds of useful consciousness, some of which is spent feeling disoriented, and I know I'd be a danger if driving. But the lifestyle changes caused by loss of driving are more mentally challenging than the fact of the ICD itself.
Mine isn't quite the same but I have had bilateral tonic-clonic seizures (Previously called "Grand Mal") and time traveling like that isn't ever fun.
Lots of different sorts of 'heart attack'. My form of VF is basically due to an electrical fault, not due to blocked arteries / clagged up valves, etc. Implantation has some risks (infection, etc) and the device needs to be swapped out every few years when the battery dies. The device can only help if you have a 'shockable' rhythm. It doesn't restart a stopped heart, it causes the out-of-control muscle fibres in a fibrillating (quivering) heart to resynchronise so that you get proper pumping in the heart's chambers.
Cost is obviously a factor as well.
i think the reasonable alternative to this led to all the red Automated External Defibrillator stations around
which is quite a social cyborg thing to do
It sounds like you probably have a phobia around implants.
I don't think it's a problem for most people. Most people are more grateful to have a life saving device/organ implanted in them that allows them to live a relatively normal life that would have been impossible otherwise, than no implants but be dead/dying or living in agony.
As an example, a friend had surgery for a badly broken bone, he ended up with a metal rod in his body. He was given the option to have it removed, but most people, including himself don't take it. The risks of complications are higher than if left in place.
My grandparents considered cochlear implants but didn't take them, not because of the fear of implants, but because they were rather experimental at the time and expensive. So they went to regular hearing aids until tech improved.
As for pacemakers, people who I know have them are much more worried of the underlying heart condition than of the device.
I personally never found them to be weird or scary. I think they're really cool, though the closest I get to a prosthesis was hearing aid, which is a wearable, not something implanted into me.
The real 'horror' is not having a leg and being unable to move. I experienced debilitating pain in one of my legs before, and the inability to walk really suck. Imagine how much more it would suck if you permanently lost a leg.
It probably also helps that it's a relatively simple, mechanical part. If I was editing my brain, that would bring up all sorts of philosophical problems that would probably paralyze me with indecision.
Same issue with implants. Do I really need a cochlear implant? Do I really need you to drill in my skull? I don't trust your surgery intentions enough. I think I'd rather learn to read lips and sign language.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/20/23882888/elon-musk-brain-...
[2] https://www.reuters.com/technology/elon-musks-neuralink-may-...
I also have two stents in my heart. I was going to have a heart attack within five years. Again, I'll take the implants, and be glad for the chance. I can still run. I can still climb stairs, and I can do it without fear.
None of these are intended to augment me (though I see better at distance than I have since kindergarten). They're intended to let me live normally rather than degraded.
And in both cases, no, the implants didn't freak me out at all. I basically never think about them, but when I do, it's with gratitude, not revulsion.
Thanks for that, even if it was accidental.
I remember when I was young a friend broke their leg badly and needed one of those devices with the scaffold that has pins going into their legs, I couldn’t even look at it it freaked me out too much. Maybe that experience gave me a phobia
and i had bad ankle break a year or so ago, and needed lots of external meccano to stabilise it. it wasn't fun, and very inconvenient, but not too painful or scary.