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Comment by prmph | Hacker News Reader

Is it recommended to take or give aspirin ASAP before the EMTs arrive? If so, I wonder if the dad took it.

Apparently it's no longer recommended, since it could also be an aortic rupture, and aspirin would make it worse. https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/should-i-take-an...

Depends on protocols, but hence why EMS’ job is recognition of the right issue (the best we can do), there are things we can evaluate to determine if we think its an aortic aneurysm even at the emt level to rule that out before making the determination to give aspirin (eg: comparing bilateral blood pressures, checking for pulsating masses)

a heart attack is far more common than an aortic aneurysm.

would comparing bilateral blood pressure (which I assume the patient could do themselves) be enough? I'm not asking for medical advice, just like... what would _you_ do if it was you who had sudden chest pain?

Id encourage you (generally, outside of hn) to lookup the symptoms of a heart attack and aortic aneurysm.

A aortic aneurysm can present with a pulsating mass in the abdomen, and is more common in older people and smokers. The inner lumen of the aorta starts to separate and blood can flow differently or be restricted, eg: right arm bp may be different than left arm. But absence of that doesn’t rule it out entirely.

Whereas a heart attack is going to feel pain in the chest, perhaps radiating to the jaw, shoulder, back, maybe nausea, sweating, and an impending sense of doom.

Automated bp cuffs are pretty inaccurate imo, we use them at the tail end of transport to the hospital and they usually spit out wild numbers. An auscultated bp with a stethoscope and sphygmomanometer is the gold standard.

Bottom line, If you are having chest pain, call 911.

Thank you for sharing.

I googled a bit and I'm not sure I would follow the new advice simply because it totally depends on getting help to you fast enough such that they can determine if its a heart attack or something else.

In the writer's case that help never came, so personally if I had to choose I'd rather go with the risk of guessing the symptoms wrong and making things some percentage worse vs a possible death.

Assuming no sensitivities/allergies, give 300mg chewed for faster absorption immediately. Normally (where I am) the dispatcher will tell you to do that on the phone.

Yes you could (assuming no allergies or gi bleeds) and just inform the incoming EMTs

How can one preemptively test if they have an allergy? Is there a dosage that is known to trigger detectable allergy symptoms without going full anaphylaxis?

I'm getting up there in age and that is presumably something that I should learn about myself...

As an EMT, I’d say to ask your primary care provider :-)

Don’t want to suggest you do something and end up with anaphylaxis.

And this right here is the problem. Possibly-imperfect knowledge is being self-censored for legal concerns, and what we are left with is silence.

A bunch of people don’t even have a primary care provider now.

> Possibly-imperfect knowledge is being self-censored for legal concerns

It’s not out of legal concern. I do not know how one tests an allergy, I’m not an MD..

Im sure google could suggest some options or maybe a test.

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