The field has changed: new data support a new approach

After decades of a conservative sports cardiology approach, recent findings call these universal restrictions into question. First, data on the use of automatic external defibrillators (AEDs) for witnessed sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) in sports have been reassuring.2 When SCA is properly recognised and an AED immediately available, survival from SCA during sport is largely possible.

Second, two reports, one focusing on long QT syndrome in athletes,3 and another on catecholaminergic ventricular tachycardia,4 have suggested that the risk of competition may be acceptable if athletes are well-informed and fully compliant with therapy. A recent task force of the American Heart Association and American College of Cardiology has suggested that competitive sports practice may be permissible in some athletes with channelopathies, assuming that appropriate precautionary measures are in place. Specifically, avoidance of exacerbating drugs, avoidance of dehydration, appropriate electrolyte replenishment (with drinks containing Mg²⁺ and K⁺) and establishment of an emergency action plan with staff trained in cardiopulmonary resuscitation and access to an AED.5

Third, in a recently analysis of 184 consecutive deaths in patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy referred to a single cardiac pathology …