Terminal cardiac mechanism in coronary artery disease: Report of two cases

A case is reported in which ventricular tachycardia was followed by cardiac standstill; the cause of death was coronary artery disease. This is in support of the contention of Grieco and Schwartz that cardiac standstill should occur as frequently as ventricular fibrillation, and that, if more records could be obtained, additional instances of cardiac standstill would probably be discovered.A second case, in which ventricular fibrillation occurred during the period of terminal cardiac activity, is added to the five such cases which have been previously reported by others.