You know those famous scene in The Rock & Pulp Fiction?

[E equals MC2]

The Rock: That fake VX gas is released and Cage is instructed to jam that fvcking 10" nail they call syringe into his heart and inject atropine in order to save himself

Pulp Fiction: Thurman ODs on coke and Travolta had to stab the syringe into her heart, breaking past her chest plate.

Is such procedure real?

1. Is there a case you have to inject atropine right into their heart & WTF is atropine anyway?

2. If so why through the heart vs just injecting it through the arm?

3. If you stab yourself in the heart, wouldn't you have effectively killed yourself?

 

[James Bond]

Originally posted by: E equals MC2
The Rock: That fake VX gas is released and Cage is instructed to jam that fvcking 10" nail they call syringe into his heart and inject atropine in order to save himself

Pulp Fiction: Thurman ODs on coke and Travolta had to stab the syringe into her heart, breaking past her chest plate.

Is such procedure real?

1. Is there a case you have to inject atropine right into their heart & WTF is atropine anyway?

2. If so why through the heart vs just injecting it through the arm?

3. If you stab yourself in the heart, wouldn't you have effectively killed yourself?

Great scene (on Pulp Fiction, at least)

 

[IceBergSLiM]

I don't know but a needle puncture wound is much different than a knife stab wound.

 

[SirStev0]

When your body starts to shut down due to cardiac arrest or drug overdose like heroin, there is a large parasympathic tell your crazily beating heart to chill out and slow down. The problem is that it works too well in these cases and your heart basically slows down to nothing and you die...

Atropine works by blocking the receptors in the heart for acetylcholine (the neurotransmitter that is telling your heart to slow down).
This keeps your heart a pumping.

Acetylcholine is also huge in muscle contractions... which is one of the things attacked by nerve agents... Atropine blocks them too, keeping your muscles from spasming.

 

[The Boston Dangler]

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/short/333/7569/614

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/050218.html

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

This is also seen on the Firefly episode "Out of Gas".

 

[imported_Imp]

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus
This is also seen on the Firefly episode "Out of Gas".

I just watched that this weekend. Didn't get it cause I was surfing/doing other stuff.

And this whole time I though the needle in the heart was to make circulation of the drug quicker...

 

[zanejohnson]

Originally posted by: Imp

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus
This is also seen on the Firefly episode "Out of Gas".

I just watched that this weekend. Didn't get it cause I was surfing/doing other stuff.

And this whole time I though the needle in the heart was to make circulation of the drug quicker...

she didnt OD on coke, she OD'd on heroin.... i dont know how you missed that part.

 

[zanejohnson]

if someone takes you to the hospital because your overdosing on heroin they shoot you up with narcon...

 

[imported_Imp]

Originally posted by: zanejohnson

Originally posted by: Imp

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus
This is also seen on the Firefly episode "Out of Gas".

I just watched that this weekend. Didn't get it cause I was surfing/doing other stuff.

And this whole time I though the needle in the heart was to make circulation of the drug quicker...

she didnt OD on coke, she OD'd on heroin.... i dont know how you missed that part.

I really hope you misquoted...

 

[adairusmc]

When we did NBC training when I was still in the military we were always told to inject ourselves in the thigh with the atropine kit.

 

[ForumMaster]

Originally posted by: zanejohnson

Originally posted by: Imp

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus
This is also seen on the Firefly episode "Out of Gas".

I just watched that this weekend. Didn't get it cause I was surfing/doing other stuff.

And this whole time I though the needle in the heart was to make circulation of the drug quicker...

she didnt OD on coke, she OD'd on heroin.... i dont know how you missed that part.

well you would know best...

 

[buck]

Originally posted by: zanejohnson
if someone takes you to the hospital because your overdosing on heroin they shoot you up with narcon...

Did your wife tell you that afterwards?

 

[Kelvrick]

One of the senoir managers at work carries one of those needles around wiht her. Don't know exactly whats in it, but apparently she's so allergic to peanuts, I guess she needs to get stabbed with the needle if she ever eats some.

 

[zanejohnson]

Originally posted by: buck

Originally posted by: zanejohnson
if someone takes you to the hospital because your overdosing on heroin they shoot you up with narcon...

Did your wife tell you that afterwards?

i've never OD'd and i've never been shot up with narcon, although i do have some.... i used to keep it on hand when i was using.

 

[SirStev0]

Originally posted by: Kelvrick
One of the senoir managers at work carries one of those needles around wiht her. Don't know exactly whats in it, but apparently she's so allergic to peanuts, I guess she needs to get stabbed with the needle if she ever eats some.

Those are epinephrine pens... Part of the sympathetic system (fight or flight) is to open your airways and get lots of blood flow... it counters the allergic response to shut off the airway.

EDIT: As a note ... in case you ever have to stab her.. those go in the leg ... not the heart...

 

[miniMUNCH]

I worked for a company that made EMT atropine injection systems... a set dose in a 'quick strike' syringe... and yes the syringe was huge and very strong.

from what little I remember now... If you have to inject yourself it is better to do it in your thigh probably... too high a chance of you fvcking up and bending or breaking the syringe on your ribs. A trained EMT or doc may inject into your heart if necessary.

 

[James Bond]

Originally posted by: Imp

Originally posted by: zanejohnson

Originally posted by: Imp

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus
This is also seen on the Firefly episode "Out of Gas".

I just watched that this weekend. Didn't get it cause I was surfing/doing other stuff.

And this whole time I though the needle in the heart was to make circulation of the drug quicker...

she didnt OD on coke, she OD'd on heroin.... i dont know how you missed that part.

I really hope you misquoted...

...? She _did_ OD on heroin, like zane pointed out.

 

[mordantmonkey]

Originally posted by: zanejohnson

Originally posted by: buck

Originally posted by: zanejohnson
if someone takes you to the hospital because your overdosing on heroin they shoot you up with narcon...

Did your wife tell you that afterwards?

i've never OD'd and i've never been shot up with narcon, although i do have some.... i used to keep it on hand when i was using.

-you did heroin? really?... what's it like?
-it's heroin. it's great, it gets you really high.
/mr.show

 

[Xavier434]

The scene with the Rock is very real except I believe you can inject the stuff in your leg. I asked my step father about that back in the day. He is a retired captain of an SSN attack submarine. The info was not classified so he was able to tell me some stuff about both the gas and the injection procedure. He said that what you see in the movie about how the gas effects the body is not far from the truth either which is pretty scary.

 

[invidia]

Originally posted by: Xavier434
The scene with the Rock is very real except I believe you can inject the stuff in your leg. I asked my step father about that back in the day. He is a retired captain of an SSN attack submarine. The info was not classified so he was able to tell me some stuff about both the gas and the injection procedure. He said that what you see in the movie about how the gas effects the body is not far from the truth either which is pretty scary.

It's real but you don't stab it directly into your heart. I think it is your leg.

 

[Xavier434]

Originally posted by: invidia

Originally posted by: Xavier434
The scene with the Rock is very real except I believe you can inject the stuff in your leg. I asked my step father about that back in the day. He is a retired captain of an SSN attack submarine. The info was not classified so he was able to tell me some stuff about both the gas and the injection procedure. He said that what you see in the movie about how the gas effects the body is not far from the truth either which is pretty scary.

It's real but you don't stab it directly into your heart. I think it is your leg.

Yes, that's right

 

[AndrewR]

Originally posted by: Xavier434
The scene with the Rock is very real except I believe you can inject the stuff in your leg. I asked my step father about that back in the day. He is a retired captain of an SSN attack submarine. The info was not classified so he was able to tell me some stuff about both the gas and the injection procedure. He said that what you see in the movie about how the gas effects the body is not far from the truth either which is pretty scary.

I'm trying to figure out how being a Captain of a nuclear attack submarine gives you special information on chemical weapons, but anyway...

Current military procedures call for injection into the "meat" of the thigh with the atropine autoinjector or for injection into the butt if you have puny thighs (so you don't stick the needle into the bone, which would be classified as "bad"). Since it's an autoinjector and is spring loaded, you just press it into your leg, and the needle deploys automatically. In fact, part of the training is that you do NOT make some dramatic gesture to jam it into your leg because you may not position it properly.

Gross but funny in the how-in-the-world-could-he-do-that sense story...had an instructor tell us that in class he attended to become a trainer, the instructor did not know that the injector he was holding was not a non-functioning demo unit. He pressed the top of the pen and released the needle straight through his thumb! Ouch. I suppose it was a good demonstration of the power of the autoinjector, but I don't imagine he ever treated "dummy" autoinjectors the same way again.

Incidentally, the needle in those things is only about 1.5" long, maybe 2", so I'm fairly certain it's too short for injection into the heart.