is a cardiac arrest the same as a heart attack and what happens when you have one

Question: is a cardiac arrest the same as a heart attack and what happens when you have one
- Keywords:
  cardiac,
  health,
  heart attack
Asked by sam to Andy, Duane, Giovanna, Katie, Theresia on 14 Nov 2014.
- Katie Pickering answered on 14 Nov 2014:
  
  Basically the heart goes into a spasm and can contract really fast kind of like in a fluttering motion. As it is not contracting fully it cannot push the blood around the body properly. If blood is not getting to the brain and the all the major organs it can be quite bad. Blood carries all the oxygen to the brain and organs and all the other nutrients and chemicals we need to function. If all of this isn;t getting to where it needs to be we can get quite poorly and in extreme cases may die.
- Duane Mellor answered on 14 Nov 2014:
  
  Basically yes, its other name is Myocardial Infarction or MI, sometimes on medical programmes they call it a STEMI or ST elevated Myocardial Infarction as this is how they measure it on a electrocardiogram

Question: is a cardiac arrest the same as a heart attack and what happens when you have one