While epinephrine-like drugs are classic therapy for Stokes-Adams seizures, it is critical to ensure syncope is due to asystole or bradycardia to avoid precipitating fatal ventricular fibrillation.
THE classic therapy for Stokes-Adams seizures has A long been the epinephrinelike drugs, administered orally or parenterally.1 Epinephrine may relieve such seizures by ventricular acceleration after diminution of the grade of atrioventricular block or by direct stimulation of an idioventricular pacemaker. Before epinephrine is used, however, it is important to determine that the syncope is due to asystole or bradycardia rather than abnormal ventricular rhythm of a prefibrillatory type in which epinephrine may precipitate fatal ventricular fibrillation.Both atrial and ventricular rates are increased by epinephrine in complete heart block. The effect on the rate of the atrial contraction bears . . .
Gale et al. (Thu,) studied this question.