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January 13, 2006 - Eighth-grade Students To Be Screened For Risk Of Sudden Cardiac Death

January 13, 2006

Eighth-grade Students To Be Screened For Risk Of Sudden Cardiac Death

What:   Young Hearts For Life™ Cardiac Screening
When:  Friday, January 20, 2006, beginning at 12:30 p.m.
Where: Butler Junior High School, 2801 York Road Oak Brook, Illinois 60523

An overwhelming body of scientific evidence points to a serious omission in routine pre-participation sports physicals, namely a simple, noninvasive test that can detect the leading cause of sudden cardiac death in young athletes.

An electrocardiogram (abbreviated ECG or EKG), which records the heart’s electrical activity, can signal the presence of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, or HCM as it is called for short. HCM is a genetic abnormality present in one in 500 people. It enlarges the left ventricle of the heart, which in turn can trigger fatal heart-rhythm disturbances. An EKG detects certain impulse patterns or “markers” associated with HCM that a stethoscope cannot.

The mission of Young Hearts For Life™ Cardiac Screening, a new EKG-screening program created by Midwest Heart Foundation, is to identify students with HCM before it can kill them literally in mid-stride.

“Early detection is essential; you cannot treat what has not been diagnosed,” explains Campaign Chairman Joseph Marek, MD, a research cardiologist at the foundation and practicing physician at Midwest Heart Specialists.

The first Young Hearts For Life™ Cardiac Screening is scheduled at 12:30 p.m., Friday, January 20, at Butler Junior High School, Oak Brook, Illinois. Students who participate (with their parents’ permission) will be given a brief EKG. Throughout the process, their confidentiality, privacy and individual modesty will be respected. Girls will be given exam gowns (similar to hospital gowns) and screened by female technicians in an area separate from boys. A report of each student's test results is mailed to the home address of record

Medically compelling case for screening
HCM annually claims the lives of 200 to 300 high school and college students who play sports—many of whom, up to the moment of death, may have appeared physically robust and even gifted with exceptional athletic talent.

Tragically, the general circumstances of their deaths can be very similar. A young athlete abruptly collapses during vigorous exercise such as a sports competition or practice, and dies. Distraught parents, relatives and friends often first hear about HCM after an autopsy confirms it was the cause of death. They are left to grieve knowing that an EKG might have alerted physicians in time to begin treatment, which can help HCM patients live to a near normal life span.

Many people, upon learning about EKG screenings for HCM, ask, “Why hasn’t this been done sooner?” It has. In Europe.

A series of reports published in mid-2005 in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal examined this issue.* Both noted that European countries are far more aggressive in their pursuit of diagnosing HCM and other heart defects in teenagers and young adults.

In fact, the International Olympic Committee deemed the case for screening was so medically compelling that it called for young athletes to be tested every two years, starting at age 12 or 14. (HCM may not appear until late adolescence, so a negative screening at age 12 may be followed by a positive repeat test at age 14 or older.) The committee’s recommendation was quickly followed by a statement published in the European Heart Journal calling for screenings to be done across the continent.

Overcoming barriers to screening
One of the most common objections to adding a routine EKG screening to standard sports physicals raised by American medical groups is that about 10 percent will result in false positive test results, requiring those students to undergo further testing only to be told an abnormality is not present. That situation begs the question: Which is worse, dealing with a false positive or with the death of a son or daughter?

Young Hearts For Life™ Cardiac Screening seeks to partner with parents within the supportive environment of their neighborhood schools, to facilitate screenings, raise public awareness of HCM and promote prevention efforts by other medical professionals.

In presentations before school groups, Dr. Marek asks the audience to imagine the unbearable pain parents of young athletes with undiagnosed HCM experience after receiving a phone call from the coroner notifying them that their son or daughter died suddenly. He concludes, “As a parent, can you imagine anything worse?”

* The Wall Street Journal Online, “Case Grows for Screening Young Athletes For Dangerous Heart Conditions,” by Kevin Helliker and Kathryn Kranhold, June 21,2005. The Wall Street Journal Online, “Doctors Miss Signs of Heart Defects In Young Athletes,” by Kevin Helliker and Kathryn Kranhold, June 23,2005. The New York Times—On The Web, “U.S. and Europe Differ on Testing Athletes for Rare Heart Ailment,” by Jere Longman, June 23, 2005.

Midwest Heart Foundation is a nonprofit research and education foundation dedicated to improving the prevention and management of cardiovascular and related diseases through research, education, and community leadership. It was established in 1988 by Midwest heart Specialists.