I've been reading about resuscitation, and found several suggestions that people don't continue breathing after effective heart function stops because the diaphragm quickly runs out of oxygen. Is this correct?
As best I can tell, current conventions are to continue to attempt resuscitation so long as brain stem cells are likely to stay alive, which, at normal body temperature, seems to be somewhere around 5 minutes after loss of pulse.
But while the brain stem is alive, does the respiration center not continue to (try to) breathe? If so, does the diaphragm really use all of its blood's reserve oxygen in just a few breaths, and simply not have energy to breathe? If not, is there some other effect that impairs breathing when the heart is not pumping effectively? I suspect it's the latter, since otherwise CPR would never include respiration, and effective CPR would be evidenced by the subject's breathing.