Venkatesh and Sudden Death Syndrome

Obvious questions on the title goes as follows, I would presume,


1) Who is this Venkatesh we are talking about?

• He is 28 year old Bangalore foot ball player who suddenly collapsed ahead of his side's game against SW Railway. 
• As a midfielder for A division club Bangalore Mars, he went on as substitute in the 73rd minute and collapsed toward the end of the game, local media reported on Thursday.  
• Unfortunately due to the lack of medical infrastructure of Bangalore Football Stadium ( sad to know they did NOT even have an ambulance on crew on hand ). 
• Since there was no ambulance available and Venkatesh was taken to the Hosmat Hospital on Wednesday in a three-wheel auto-rickshaw. 
• It appears that he died on his way to hospital due to what suspected namely, the SUDDEN DEATH SYNDROME.

2) Now, What is the Sudden Death Syndrome and how it happens?

• The heart is a muscle itself, and like any muscle, it needs blood supply to provide oxygen for it to work. 
• Normally, the coronary arteries lie on the surface of the heart.
•  Anomalous arteries dive into the heart muscle itself and may be occluded when the heart muscle that surrounds the abnormally placed artery squeezes aggressively, as with exercise, shutting off blood supply to part of the heart. 
• This irritates the electrical system and can cause ventricular fibrillation and sudden death.

3) Shocking!??!! How come it can happen so suddenly?

• Commotio cordis is a situation in which the heart stops when the chest is hit by an object. 
• News stories occasionally report of players who are hit in the chest by a ball and collapse because their heart stops beating. 
• The heart sits behind the breastbone, and the electrical system can be short circuited when a direct blow is sustained.

4) Why are we talking about it now?
This unfortunate incident happened at the same time, where another footballer, namely,Fabrice Muamba, underwent the same sudden death Syndrome and was breathless for about 78 minutes and infact termed dead, miraculously survived at this time of writing. 
If one compares the difference between these two human survival stories, one thing that stands strong and tall is the life supporting system of pitch-side assistence for these sportsmen.  
While Fabrice Muamba was immediately taken care by the pitch side assistents as you could see below, Venkatesh was taken to the hospitals by his fellow players in an auto-rickshaw due to nonavailability of basic amenities required for a reputed football stadium.

VS.

"Maybe if he had been given oxygen or proper medical care at the time of the incident, he could have stood a chance", says the doctor of Hosmat hospital where Venkatesh got admitted dead. Irony, indeed!!


I hope and sincerely believe that some of the readers of this blog post, could help spread the word to their peers/friends/other members in their circle of influence working in sports authorities, to take care of these valuable lessons to be learned to save more Venkatesh's in the days to come.