Sudden death during sport activities: A malaysian perspective.

ABSTRACT

This is a retrospective study of sports related deaths on the human bodies brought for autopsy in the last 10 years (from 1995-2005) at University Malaya Medical Center (UMMC), Kuala Lumpur. The objective of this study was to know the cause of death, manner of death, ethnicity, food habits, timings of incident, number of cases and other related information like history of metabolic disorders or any other underlying diseases. All cases were analyzed in relation to age, gender, race, causes of death, type of sport activities and victim’s profile. The present study included those subjects who had died either during playing or immediately after it. Our results showed the most common age group affected in such sports related sudden deaths to be ranging between 40 – 49 years and the least affected were between 0 – 9 years of age. Out of 44 cases reanalyzed, 33 were male and1 was female. Among the ethnic group, most of the subjects were Chinese (45.45 %) followed by Malays (20.45%). This study also showed that 80% of the deaths were caused by ischemic heart disease IHD (50%) or coronary heart disease CAD (30%). Deaths were seen to be more in the subjects above 30 years of age which could be associated with the associated risk factors related to ageing. A significant number of deaths were observed while playing badminton and jogging. No serious need for mass screening was felt as the numbers of cases each year were not significant and they were isolated incidents. Although, there are few basic preventive measures like cardiac screening , lipid profile, avoidance of stressful working conditions which can be easily adopted to decrease loss of life. Incidence may decrease with recreational and health maintaining activities, but absolute prevention may still not be possible.