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Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin went into cardiac arrest during the Monday Night Football game against the Cincinnati Bengals, the team confirmed via social media.
Hamlin, 24, suffered his injury early in the first quarter when he tackled Bengals wide receiver Tee Higgins, taking a blow to the chest and quickly popping back up, before suddenly collapsing.
Medical personnel administeredCPR to Hamlin for 10 minutesand appeared to give him oxygen before the ambulance took him to the UC Medical Center. He remains in critical condition.
Here’s what to know about cardiac arrest, which is often mistaken for a heart attack.
Cardiac arrest is the abrupt loss of heart function, resulting from a problem with the heart’s electrical system, according to theMayo Clinic. This disrupts the heart’s pumping action and stops blood flow through the body.
It is often fatal if proper steps aren’t taken immediately. CPR can improve the chances of survival until emergency medical assistance arrives. More than 356,000 cardiac arrests occur outside a hospital in the United States each year, according to theAmerican Heart Association.
A person suffering a cardiac arrest can experience immediate and drastic symptoms like a sudden collapse, no pulse, no breathing, and a loss of consciousness. Warning signs can include chest discomfort, shortness of breath, weakness and a heart palpitations.
A heart attack is not the same thing as cardiac arrest, although the terms are often incorrectly used interchangeably.
Many heart attacks don’t immediately lead to sudden cardiac arrest, the AHA says, but when a cardiac arrest does occur, a heart attack is a common cause.
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Health experts note that an alarming injury like Hamlin’s could’ve caused a condition known as “commotio cordis,” which is a fatal disruption of heart rhythm after a blow to the chest wall.
Commotio cordis is rare but most common among male athletes participating in sports with projectiles. The condition is the leading cause of deaths in youth baseball in the United States, according to the AHA.
Chest protectors are potential means to prevent commotio cordis. However, the AHA reports that with commotio events in competitive sports, about one third of athletes were wearing chest wall protection equipment at the time of their cardiac arrest.
Madias told the outlet that there are about 20 to 30 commotio cordis cases reported each year.
source: people.com
