On Sudden Death

Sudden death in Chagas' disease

“…For others 7,8 , death occurring suddenly in patients with previous clinical manifestations of cardiovascular disease or any other illness should also be considered sudden death, and one classical example is the sudden death occurring after acute myocardial infarction 9 . Aiming to differentiate and better characterize these two situations, some authors when referring to sudden death in ischemic heart disease 10 , and mainly in Chagas' disease [11][12][13][14] , started to classify it as unexpected and expected, in order to consider just the first one as the true representative of this condition 14 . From our point of view, this differentiation has no clinical importance because, for prevention, its triggering mechanism is much more important than death expectancy.…”

Sudden death in patients with Chagas disease

“…The SD in CD, in practically all cases, is cardiac (Rocha 1986) and as in other cardiopathies (Paulo & Schatz 1971) it is useful to distinguish between two types: expected (SED) and unexpected (SUD).…”

The relevance of platelet and fibrin thromboembolism of the coronary microcirculation, with special reference to sudden cardiac death.

“…These observations support the potential importance of the process described and suggest that it might contribute significantly to sudden death in young patients with coronary artery disease, often as the first evidence of the presence of heart disease. Although the incidence of IHD increases with age, there is ample evidence that in the younger age group, IHD carries a relatively more serious prognosis with a higher risk of sudden cardiac death.40 44 IHD has also been associated with abnormal platelet reactivity.43 4 In conclusion, a subgroup of sudden death patients with IHD has been identified in whom microcirculatory platelet thrombosis appears to be the main cardiac pathologic process. Studies of larger populations are necessary to obtain further information on this important subject.…”