ESC warns the public to be aware of risk factors following Philippe Seguin's death

"Following the sudden death yesterday of the former French government minister Philippe Séguin, who suffered a fatal heart attack, aged 66, the European Society of Cardiology is warning the public of the dangers of leaving risk factors such as hyperlipidemia, hypertension or diabetes untreated. Other major risk factors for coronary artery disease are smoking or being overweight. ESC spokesperson Professor Nicolas Danchin, an expert in Acute Cardiac Care, explains: 'You can have a heart attack leading to sudden death without having any symptoms before and so as you have had no symptoms you can’t really prevent it or prepare for that eventuality. The only way to try to avoid that is to have a proper lifestyle with regular exercise and to have a proper diet. If you are aware of risk factors such as diabetes or hypertension, then you should treat these.' Although in today's society progress has been made in the control of some risk factors, such as smoking, hyperlipidemia and hypertension; other risk factors such as overweight, obesity and diabetes are still increasing in alarming proportions"

Free heart tests in memory of teenage Brentford fan (UK)

The Tom Clabburn Memorial Fund will be running free heart screenings for young people at Brentford Football Club as part of a Cry and Philips Test My Heart Tour, the first free national heart screening programme, which aims to promote awareness of sudden death syndrome and sudden cardiac arrest among 14 to 35-year-olds.

HEARTS aims to save young lives (USA)

In May, nearly 100 6th graders were screened for cardiac problems at Key Middle School, Texas, USA. Preliminary results show that 10 of those children had problems that needed medical treatment. Two of those students had heart abnormalities that could have led to sudden death. The findings led those two children to be treated at Children’s Memorial Hermann. Five other Key Middle School students had heart conditions that need to be monitored. Three more students had high blood pressure problems that required treatment. The results surprised Dr. John Higgins, the principal investigator of the Houston Early Age Risk Testing and Screening Study or HEARTS program

ArrhythmiA Awareness Week (UK)

ArrhythmiA Awareness Week - 8-14 June 2009 - raising awareness of arrhythmias and sudden death in your respective area

Triathlons pose more heart risks than marathon races, especially in swim portion, study finds

Warning to weekend warriors: Swim-bike-run triathlons pose at least twice the risk of sudden death as marathons do, the first study of these competitions has found. The risk is mostly from heart problems during the swimming part. And while that risk is low - about 15 out of a million participants - it's not inconsequential, the study's author says. Triathlons are soaring in popularity, especially as charity fundraisers. They are drawing many people who are not used to such demanding exercise. Each year, about 1,000 of these events are held and several hundred thousand Americans try one. "It's something someone just signs up to do," often without a medical checkup to rule out heart problems, said Dr. Kevin Harris, a cardiologist at the Minneapolis Heart Institute at Abbott Northwestern Hospital. "They might prepare for a triathlon by swimming laps in their pool. That's a lot different than swimming in a lake or a river." He led the study and presented results Saturday at an American College of Cardiology conference in Florida. The Minneapolis institute's foundation sponsored the work and tracks athlete-related sudden deaths in a national registry. - AP

Sudden heart failure gene discovered (Holland)

"Researchers have discovered the gene responsible for sudden heart failure among young people, the Amsterdam Medical Centre (AMC) said. In a study, the results of which will be published on the American Journal of Human Genetics website, the focus was on familiar idiopathic ventricle fibrillation, an unexplained life-threatening heart rhythm disorder. People who suffer from this disorder experience unexpected fast contractions of the muscles of the heart chamber. This blocks the heart's regular pumping function and quickly results in cardiac arrest" - 9news

Clinic aims to prevent sudden deaths

When 16-year-old Taylor Allan suddenly died of an undiagnosed fatal heart defect last April, her family and friends were devastated and confused. It was only after the death of this seemingly healthy young athlete that they learned she had a deadly genetic cardiac abnormality that had gone undetected all her life. Now, there's new help in Kingston for people who have these unusual cardiac diseases. A new clinic is opening at Hotel Dieu Hospital to help prevent deaths such as Allan's from happening by diagnosing potentially fatal genetic heart problems with a highly specialized series of tests. Dr. Chris Simpson, medical director of the joint cardiac program at Hotel Dieu and Kingston General hospitals, said that though these conditions are rare, most cases go undiagnosed or underdiagnosed. "They're much more common than we thought," he said. "So finding them in advance, before people have their sudden death episode, can prevent it." Simpson estimated there are about four or five deaths from genetic heart conditions in Kingston each year. "I think they're all preventable," he said. Canada only has a handful of specialized genetic heart defect clinics, including ones in Halifax, Ottawa and Toronto. "This [Kingston] clinic gives us a chance to get the word out there to people that these diseases do exist," said Simpson. Kingston's Inherited Heart Rhythm Disease Clinic targets patients and their families who need to be tested for genetic heart diseases - Whig Standard

Grim toll of sudden heart death

"On Friday 5 October last year, Tom Clabburn did not wake up for school. Tom was just 14 when he died suddenly and completely unexpectedly from an undiagnosed heart condition. He was a bright, funny, active, and seemingly healthy teenager - the kind of boy everyone liked. In the UK, 12 young people die from an undiagnosed heart condition every week. They are people who inherited a structural abnormality or an electrical fault of the heart. This new figure has been collated by the charity CRY - Cardiac Risk in the Young - and denotes deaths among people up to the age of 35. It is based on data from the Office of National Statistics for 2005, and represents an increase of 50% on the previous estimate of eight deaths a week" - BBC