I was watching Detective Conan today and the validity of the dying message was denied because “obviously” someone shot through the heart would no longer be able to move or attempt to write the letter ‘S’ using her blood. Despite the gun used was a double barrel shotgun, I still have my doubts about the “obvioustisity” of the claim that the cops in Detective Conan were stating.
So I asked around some bio people:
If you were shot through the heart, would you still be able to move? Would it basically be like suffocating or a heart attack? Or are you dead instantaneously, sort of like if I shot you through the brain? Feel free to replace “you” with anyone you don’t like.
I think I may have scared some people when I instant messaged them with that question. No, I do not believe in using guns to kill people, but slicing off people’s head is another story.
It turns out, many agree you won’t die instantaneously, like the second after you’re shot, but you will very soon after if the shot was fatal.
Unusually low mortality of penetrating wounds of the chest. Twelve years’ experience (from hkenshin):
Within a 12-year period ending in March 1984, 1109 patients with penetrating thoracic injuries were treated at King-Drew Medical Center located in south central Los Angeles. The average age of the patients was 28.1 years. There were 607 stab wounds and 502 gunshot wounds. Antibiotic prophylaxis was prescribed only for the 428 patients who had laparotomy, thoracotomy, and pulmonary contusion with hemoptysis. Of the 1109 patients, 105 had cardiac injuries. All patients with cardiac trauma underwent thoracotomy, and the mortality rate was 18.1%. Specifically, the mortality rate of gunshot wound of the heart 24.5% and that of stab wound of the heart, 11.5%. In contrast, of the 1004 patients without cardiac injuries, only 115 required thoracotomy and the mortality rate in this group was 0.8% (8/1004). The mortality rate was 69.6% in patients who had a thoracotomy in the emergency room but only 2.8% in patients who had a thoracotomy in the operating room within the first 24 hours after admission. In the 242 patients who had associated abdominal injuries, the mortality rate was 2.1% (5/242), as compared with 2.5% (22/867) for those who had isolated chest injuries. In the entire group, the incidence of complications was 5.1%, of which 1.8% were infectious complications. The presence of associated abdominal injuries did not influence the outcome. The mortality rate in noncardiac thoracic injuries is very low compared with that of cardiac injury. Because of the complexity of the injury, gunshot wound of the heart has the highest mortality rate.
I would attempt a guess that a gunshot wound, even a very big bullet hole through your heart, would be something like a cardiac arrest (heart attack), but the big difference, is that you’re going to have blood spilling out as hkenshin noted. I would say I’d still be able to move or twitch around a bit after a shot through the heart.
Decathanerd believes I need to conduct some studies and gather empirical evidence to validate my claim. I think the funnest part would be selecting my “volunteers”. Anyone that knows I don’t like you, please e-mail me. I’ve got a fun task that you’d die to know about!