Is the Heart Really a Pump?
Updated: Mar 15, 2022
In my blog post Why We Don’t See Atherosclerosis in Veins I introduced a concept known as EZ water and showed that when it forms in the lining of our blood vessels it serves as a protective barrier to the them. In that post, I mentioned how the formation of this EZ water also creates another phenomenon within our circulatory system. This phenomenon is one that is very relevant when trying to find out how the hemodynamics of our cardiovascular system work. This concept will help us decide if the heart is really a pressure propulsion pump, or if we really need it to be.
If you need a refresher on the EZ water formation in arteries and how it happens, go back to that other post before continuing. As I mentioned in that post, when EZ water forms in a tube the area that is the EZ water has a net negative charge because of how the water splits. Because EZ water excludes everything that isn’t itself, all the leftover hydrogen ions, along with the other contents of the blood, are pushed into the center of the tube. This creates a situation where we have a highly negative area right next to a very positive area.
In his lab, Dr. Pollack has found that this situation will actually create flow of the water without any other force acting on the water. In his book, he states that “…EZ’s bear charge, which means they carry electrical potential energy. Since nature rarely discards available potential energy, EZ charge may be used to drive diverse cellular processes ranging from chemical reactions all the way to fluid flows”. (1) He saw this in his lab, any time he put a tube made of hydrophilic material into a tub of water that had energy in the form of radiant light applied to it, the water would begin to flow through the tube on it’s own.
It is pretty safe to assume that since EZ water forms in blood vessels that this fluid flow phenomenon acts on the blood and helps with blood flow. But we don’t have to assume. In an email I received from Dr. Pollack this week he stated, “My student, Zheng Li, found that the “spontaneous flow” mechanism, i.e., spontaneous flow in tubes immersed in water, applies in the cardiovascular system. So, it’s not the heart alone that propels flow, but also the vessels. Manuscript in preparation.” Below is a picture illustrating this.
But how fast can this fluid flow? Pollack discusses how the charges can create quite the energy gradient that results in very quick flow. He says, “the electrical conductivity measured parallel to surfaces that ordinarily nucleate EZ’s is 100,000 times higher than the conductivity measured through bulk water.”
Not only did Pollack find that he could create a system where water flowed, but he found that “flow of this nature could persist indefinitely if the protons and water were continually replenished……sustained water flow occurs inevitably in almost any scenario involving EZ’s and radiant energy.” This explains why the radiant energy from the sun is so important to our physiology, as well as why infrared light from saunas has been shown to increased blood flow tremendously (2), and have a direct healing effect on the lining of our arteries. (3)
There have been some other interesting experiments that show this fluid flow effect in the cardiovascular system as well. In the 1960’s a scientist named Leon Manteuffel-Szoege showed, using dogs, that after the dog died and the heart stopped blood continued to flow for up to 2 hours with no beating of the heart. (4) It eventually stopped because no more energy was being applied to the system and the water could not maintain the EZ zone next to the arteries that was driving the blood flow.
I would argue that this method of blood flow is actually the main way that the blood is moved. I say this because looking at the heart as a pressure propulsion pump that forcefully pumps blood has also been called into question. (5) (I highly recommend reading this whole citation, especially those technical geeks and engineers out there) For instance, we are told that Cardiac Output = Stroke Volume (amount of blood leaving the heart per beat) x Heart Rate. Which would make sense if the heart was a pressure propulsion pump. However, after his exhaustive research for his book, The Heart and Circulation, Dr. Branko Furst states that “Artificial pacing of the heart in animals and in humans at rates up to four times above baseline shows the CO remains the same or even drops.” (6) How could the amount of times the heart pumps be increased, and the cardiac output remain the same?
Further, it has also been shown that the heart is a pretty inefficient pressure propulsion pump. One study found that if we look at the efficiency of the heart muscle cells based on the energy expenditure from the cells and the amount of blood it supposedly “pumps”, then the heart is only 15-30% efficient. (7) From an evolutionary perspective, for evolution to create something that is only 15-30% efficient at its job doesn’t make sense. Unless the job of the heart is not to pump the blood.
If the heart as a pressure propulsion pump does not make sense based on experiments, and the body has a mechanism of moving the blood without the heart, then how exactly does the heart work and why is it even there?
Well it turns out that the heart operates more like what’s called a hydraulic ram. (8) A hydraulic ram is flow activated (meaning fluid is already flowing into it propelled by some other force) and has no motor. Considering the blood has its own flow and the heart is a poor force producing organ this would make sense. Let’s compare the two and see what we find. The letters labeling the hydraulic ram image below may seem random, but they are that way so that you can match them up with their analogous structures in the heart image. For a video explaining the hydraulic ram go here.
Water is flowing into the ram under the force of gravity through the pipe (I,H). The first chamber (A) catches the water and at first some of the water spills out of the spill valve (B). Once enough water fills the chamber the spill valve closes because of built up pressure and then water pushes up through the one-way valve (C) at the top. Water flowing through here ends up in a second chamber (D). Prior to the water being in here, there would be air, so as the water flows into this chamber it compresses the air building up pressure. Once the pressure builds up enough it pushes the water back down closing the one-way valve (C). Since the water can’t go back the way it came, it goes out through the pipe (G). Once it flows out, pressure drops through the whole system and new water flows into the first chamber (A) starting the whole process again. Now let’s look compare that to the heart.
As we will see the heart is pretty similar to the hydraulic ram, though there are two slight differences. As we discussed, the building of EZ water and hydrogen ions are driving the flow of blood through the veins (H, I) toward the heart much like gravity was doing in the hydraulic ram. Once it arrives, it flows into the right atrium (A), this is similar to the first chamber in the hydraulic ram. Once it gets here, this is where we find the first difference. In the heart there is technically no spill valve which was labeled B on the hydraulic ram, instead pressure builds up in the atrium (A) as blood flows in until there is enough to open the atrioventricular, or tricuspid, valve (C). This is a one-way valve just like in the hydraulic ram. Once this is open the blood flows into the right ventricle (D), mostly on its own but it does get a little push from the slight contraction of the atrium. Once in the ventricle we come to the second difference between the hydraulic ram and the heart. In the ram we had air in the second chamber (D). There is no air in the right ventricle to build up pressure and eventually push the blood out; instead we have muscle in the ventricle wall (E) that contracts (in a spiral nature) to help push the blood out of the ventricle. Since the tricuspid valve (C) is a one-way valve when the ventricle contracts the valve shuts and the blood goes out through another one-way valve, the pulmonary or semilunar valve (F), into the pulmonary artery (G). The exact same thing happens on the left side when blood is flowing back to the heart after going through the lungs, the heart is really two hydraulic rams right next to each other.
Now, you may be thinking that this sounds like a true pump. However, remember that when looked at like a pressure-propulsion pump, the heart is incredibly inefficient, only 10-30%. While the chambers of the heart do contract and move some blood through it is only enough to help blood navigate through the heart, not enough to propel blood through the whole body. A pressure-propulsion pump would be forcefully sucking blood in one side and forcefully pushing it out the other. This is not what the heart does.
I liken the heart to a pitcher and catcher in baseball practicing without a batter. The catcher is the heart and the pitcher is the self-propelling blood. The pitcher propels the ball (blood) into the catcher with great force. The catcher interrupts that flow and merely tosses the ball (blood) back out to the pitcher with much less force than it came in.
The Austrian philosopher Rudolf Steiner said that the heart functions as a damming up organ, and that it interrupts the flow of the blood. This is true, and it does this because if it were not there to slow the flow of blood, then when we create a demand for blood in our tissue (muscle), like when we exercise, all the blood would flow to the arteries and tissues (muscle) and the venous side would collapse causing the whole system to break down. Studies of soccer players have shown that their heart muscles are bigger, but not for pumping more blood due to their exercise, but because their hearts are more efficient at stopping blood. (9) The contraction of the ventricles is only needed so that when the flow of blood is interrupted by the heart the contractions can guide the blood through the chambers and not slow things down too much. So, there is some very slight pumping, but as we have seen there is no way contractions of the chambers in the heart can provide all the force needed to pump the blood through the entire body.
I also believe that the lungs play an important role in maintaining pressure in the cardiovascular system so that it works properly. I believe this because it has been shown that during a pneumothorax (loss of lung pressure) that cardiac output can drop by 66%. (10)
But the contracting ventricles of the heart have another very important role. If you look at the orientation of heart muscles and how they contract, they do so in a spiraling motion. This was first discovered in 1864. (11) This causes the blood to be vortexed, or swirled, when the ventricles contract. The blood is also vortexed when it comes into the right atrium and any time it goes through a valve. Leonardo Da Vinci was the first to note the spiraling of blood as it moved through the heart as his illustration below shows. The man was way ahead of his time.
This vortexing of blood as it travels through the heart is very important for the function of the whole system, and it completes our understanding of how wonderfully designed the system is. Another way Dr. Pollack found that water could be energized was for it to be vortexed in the presence of oxygen. I think it is no mistake that the body is set up in a way that sends the blood to the vortexing organ, the heart, then to the oxygenating organ, the lungs, and then back to the vortexing organ again. The heart energizes the water in our blood through vortexing. It does this so that EZ water can be built in the blood vessels and maintain flow. If we think about it in this sense, the heart is responsible for the movement of blood, just not in the pumping way we all learn that it is.
In this video the amazing discovery of Dr. Francisco Torrent-Guasp is discussed. The heart as a vortex and orientation of the heart muscle is thoroughly explained, keep in mind that the doctors being interviewed in the video are not aware that the heart is a hydraulic ram rather than a pressure propulsion pump.
To review, in my opinion the heart has 3 jobs; 1) to vortex blood which energizes it so it can form EZ water, 2) to maintain even pressure in the system by slowing the flow of blood during a time of increased blood requirement in tissues, and 3) it is the messenger organ in communicating the state of our stress response to our brain by being the place where we feel our emotions. I have discussed this third role of our heart as it relates to heart attacks in many previous blog posts.
To maintain healthy hemodynamics in our cardiovascular system it is essential that we get sunlight, contact with the earth, or use infrared saunas (click here and use code DRHUSSEY for $100 off an infrared sauna) so the water in our blood can stay energized enough to maintain the EZ water that protects our arteries and drives our blood flow. It is also important that we reduce our oxidative stress by restricting carbohydrates and avoiding toxin exposure. Doing this will help us avoid the breakdown of the EZ water in our arteries from free radicals. Do these things, and your blood will create its’ own flow and the system will operate as it should. Fail to do them, and it could drive the development of Congestive Heart Failure and atherosclerosis.
Stay healthy out there!
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