Our society is caught up in keeping kids and teens busy with sports, activities, homework, and other extracurriculars. In general, allowing kids to experience a variety of activities is beneficial to creating good time-management skills and developing well-rounded individuals. However, I think this desire to let all kids have a fair chance at the activity they want to participate in might be clouding judgment on actually screening kids before allowing them to participate in physical activities.
From my own perspective, I was not aware of any major medical issues I might have had. However, any time I had a pre-season examination done, it was a 10-minute-long, superficial process. The physicians assumed I was healthy enough to safely participate in intense physical activity. Fortunately, I was healthy enough - but many kids are not, and they slip through the cracks when physicians blanket all teens as young and healthy.
During my senior year of high school, a fellow classmate and star varsity basketball player passed out during practice and hit his head as he fell. He was in a coma for nearly two weeks before he died in the hospital. His family was aware of his congenital heart disease, but doctors and trainers allowed him to play anyway. According to this article, most doctors that participated in the study do not even ask about an athlete's family history or if the athlete has chest pain, etc. Clearly stricter guidelines are necessary to prevent such terrible, avoidable tragedies.
Obviously, it would be difficult to tell a child that he or she cannot play a sport or participate in an activity because of a potential risk that may or may not amount to something significant. But wouldn't it be better to be safe than sorry?
http://vitals.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/11/13/8759048-teen-athletes-often-not-screened-for-heart-risks-study-finds
I agree that there needs to be a more watchful eye on student athletes in light of the growing competitive nature of sports. As a high school or college athlete driven to be the best mentally and physically, rarely is there a thought of injury or possible underlying health problems that may slow or halt their athletic career. Teenagers by nature view themselves as untouchable to ailments or wrongs. If an all star basketball player, like your fellow classmate, were to feel light headed often during play, he may attribute it to lack of water or that he just was having an off day. The last thing on a teenager’s minds is what current ailments could mean in their long-term health and what sudden fainting, chest pain, difficulty breathing and dizziness when exercising could be pointing to. 1 out of 100,000 teenagers a year die from sudden cardiac death where the heart stops abruptly due to heart rhythm disturbances and abnormalities. There definitely needs to be a greater importance in pre season physicals and also a more thorough examination of athletes to make sure that there is not underlying symptoms that can grow into potential heart problems.
ReplyDeleteAnissa Anderson Orr. Understanding sudden death in Teen Athletes. 5 October 2010. http://www.uthealthleader.org/archive/children_teens/2004/suddendeath-0923.html
Younger and younger children are playing more competitive sports and as the number of young athletes increases there has also been an increase in the number of acute and overuse injuries seen. The younger the athlete the more they could be susceptible to injury as there are physiological differences between children and adults. This needs to be monitored closely by the young athletes parents, the coaches and also the young athletes themselves. In an article by Adirim and Cheng (2003) 6 ways to prevent injuries are given: the pre-season physical examination; medical coverage at sporting events; proper coaching; adequate hydration; proper officiating; and proper equipment and field/surface playing conditions. These all need to be monitored to ensure young athletes are kept safe.
ReplyDeleteAdirim T.A., Cheng T.L.(2003)Overview of Injuries in the Young Athlete. Sports Medicine, 33(1): 75-81.
I agree it is better to be safe than sorry because I know three college athletes that suffer from different heart conditions. Fortunately, they were diagnosed before anything too sudden or life-threatening happened.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, a lot of the heart conditions that result in sudden death are asymptomatic. Because they are asymptomatic they usually go undiagnosed (Pescasio). A way to possibly reduce the risk of letting a fatal heart condition go undiagnosed is for kids and parents to know and be honest about their family history. Sometimes kids are alone when they go in to have their sports-clearing physicals and may not know their family history or they may skip over information they don't think is relevant.
Medical professionals could always add more exams and tests to further confirm the presence or absence of heart conditions, but it would be very financially costly (Pescasio). So in order to be correctly diagnosed, parents may need to pay for additional testing.
http://www.sportssafety.org/articles/heart-disease/