Sudden cardiac deaths in young athletes still remain unsolved, the effect of high intense training puts the heart under immense stress. In both the United States and Europe it has been reported these deaths are usually due to undetected cardiovascular disease and seem to be increasing (Maron et al. 2007) Many prevention methods have been created to reduce the risk of cardiac deaths in young athletes, such as Pre-participation screening like, the electrocardiography (ECG) screening programme in Italy and the American Heart Association.
In 1982 a nationwide program of pre-participation screening including 12-lead electrocardiography (ECG) was launched in Italy. In their study Corrado et al, (2008) looked first of all at the Italians protocols. The Italians first looked at the young competitive athletes family and personal history of physical examinations. If there were no findings the young athlete would be eligible for competition however, if they found some positive findings they would do further examinations such as stress tests, and cardiac MRI. Depending on the outcome on these tests would determine whether the athlete would be eligible for competition. …show more content…
33,735 athletes undergoing pre-participation screening at the Centre for Sport Medicine in Padua, 3,016 (8.9%) were referred for additional testing, mainly echocardiography, and 621 were disqualified for cardiovascular reasons (1.8%) (Corrado D, Basso C, Schiavon M, Thiene G. 1998). Since then almost 90% of deaths in young athletes reduced due to the ECG screening (Corrado et al, 2008) which indicates the screening programme proved to be acceptable as the data provided was specific and detected the lethal cardiomyopathy or
In 1982 a nationwide program of pre-participation screening including 12-lead electrocardiography (ECG) was launched in Italy. In their study Corrado et al, (2008) looked first of all at the Italians protocols. The Italians first looked at the young competitive athletes family and personal history of physical examinations. If there were no findings the young athlete would be eligible for competition however, if they found some positive findings they would do further examinations such as stress tests, and cardiac MRI. Depending on the outcome on these tests would determine whether the athlete would be eligible for competition. …show more content…
33,735 athletes undergoing pre-participation screening at the Centre for Sport Medicine in Padua, 3,016 (8.9%) were referred for additional testing, mainly echocardiography, and 621 were disqualified for cardiovascular reasons (1.8%) (Corrado D, Basso C, Schiavon M, Thiene G. 1998). Since then almost 90% of deaths in young athletes reduced due to the ECG screening (Corrado et al, 2008) which indicates the screening programme proved to be acceptable as the data provided was specific and detected the lethal cardiomyopathy or