PULSE
June 12, 2016

“Sunday morning’s tragic shooting at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, is the worst mass shooting in US history, leaving at least 50 people dead and 53 more injured.”

“OneBlood, a blood donation organization in Florida, reported an urgent need for O-negative, O-positive and AB plasma blood donors.”

“In 2015, the US Food and Drug Administration lifted its three-decade lifetime ban on all men who have ever had sex with men, as well as transgender women, from donating blood.
The ban, however, wasn’t completely lifted: Instead of the lifetime ban, it now stands for men who have had sex with another man in the previous year. This classification is also applied to transgender women, which has been a distinct fight all its own.”

“Meanwhile, before the ban was changed last year, the Williams Institute an LGBTQ think tank at the University of California, Los Angeles, said lifting the ban completely would increase the national blood supply by as many as 615,300 additional pints of blood each year, and possibly save about a million lives per year.”

HEARTBEAT

“The heart’s system is not unlike the electrical system in a car, which times the pistons that help to spin the car’s wheels around.”

“Usually the heart’s electrical system works flawlessly, and we rarely notice it—though some people are more naturally attuned to their heart rhythms, particularly at night when other things are quiet and still. Disruptions in heart rhythms can happen, however, and when we’re aware of them it can be alarming.”

“Other common situations can trigger changes in heart rhythms too. Mild dehydration can cause the heart to beat more quickly; that’s the body’s way of trying to maintain the flow of blood when there’s less available for every beat.
A change in medication, or an interaction between medications, can trigger a temporarily abnormal heartbeat. And while the resolution can be simple (such as resting, rehydrating, or changing medications), it’s sometimes beyond our ability to understand why we feel a change in our heart rhythms or if it’s the symptom of a more urgent medical situation.”

BEAT

“In 2008, researchers at the University of Illinois medical school discovered that the 103 beat-per-minute pulse of the Bee Gees’ 1977 disco hit Stayin’ Alive provided the perfect tempo for resuscitating the heart through CPR.”

“Music moves us in part because it draws on our primal intuitions about the heartbeat. Until the mid-19th century when it was replaced by the mechanical metronome, the human heartbeat provided the standard unit of measure for musical time.”

“Music also has a communal impact on human physiology. People listening to the same music tend to synchronize not only their movements, but also their breathing and heart rhythms.“

– Jade Guanaro Kuriki-Olivo

DJ Sets

Latin Accolade for PULSE by Buffer (1:31:15)