Marathons Don’t Boost Runners’ Cardiac Arrest Risk in Study
January 18, 2012, 2:10 PM ESTBy Michelle Fay Cortez
Jan. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Competing in a marathon or half- marathon doesn’t raise a runner’s chance of suffering a cardiac arrest any more than other vigorous physical activity, according to a study reviewing a decade of data.
Researchers combed databases, search engines, local newspapers and runners’ websites to identify everyone who had a cardiac arrest, an electrical disturbance that halts the heart, during long-distance races in the U.S. from 2000 to 2010. Out of nearly 11 million participants in races of 13.1 miles (21.1 kilometers) to 26.2 miles, they identified 59 runners who suffered a cardiac arrest.
While reports of heart complications and sudden death after long races have risen in recent years, the increase stems from a greater number of participants, the investigators said. The overall danger is low, particularly compared with the risk seen in college sports, triathlons, and among previously overweight middle-age joggers, the New England Journal of Medicine report found.
“The risk associated with long-distance running events is equivalent to or lower than the risk associated with other vigorous physical activity,” said the researchers, led by Jonathan Kim from Massachusetts General Hospital’s division of cardiology. About one-fourth of runners who suffered a cardiac arrest survived, probably because onlookers started giving CPR and portable defibrillators were available to shock the heart back into rhythm, they said.
The study detected an increase in heart risks among men who were running the longest distances. The finding is troubling and suggests more high-risk men who may already have early heart disease may be taking up running to get into shape, the researchers said.
--Editors: Reg Gale, Angela Zimm
To contact the reporter on this story: Michelle Fay Cortez in Minneapolis at mcortez@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Reg Gale at rgale5@bloomberg.net
