Antonio Puerta, 22, who played football for Sevilla and Spain, has died after having a heart attack during Sevilla’s match against Getafe. During the first half of the match he collapsed as he was running back towards his goal – medics were seen preventing him from swallowing his tongue, but he did manage to walk off the pitch. It was not long before he collapsed again in the changing rooms and had to receive cardiac resuscitation before being rushed to the Virgen del Rocio hospital.
He was immediately placed in intensive care. According to Gimeno Guerrero, Puerta died of multiple organ failure due to prolonged cardiac arrest.
The Professional Football League of Spain, as well as UEFA, say they have passed on their most sincere condolences to Antonio Puerta’s family. The next match day will be declared an official day of mourning and players in Spain’s football league and fans have been asked to observe a minute’s silence prior to the start of each match.
Hundreds of Sevilla fans observed a minute’s silence outside the Virgen del Rocio hospital soon after Antonio Puerta’s death. Observers in Spain say that rival fans of Sevilla’s two league teams, Sevilla FC and Real Betis, put their jealousies to one side and tied their scarves together. After the minute’s silence, the fans chanted “Puerta, Sevilla is with you!”
How Common in Sudden Death in Athletes?
Fortunately it is a very rare event. Estimates vary greatly and are influenced by age, the source of the sampling population, the type of sports and whether or not it really was ‘sudden death’. We define ‘sudden cardiac death’ as one that is non-traumatic and unexpected, it occurs instantly or not too long after an abrupt change in the patient’s previous clinical state.
A Rhode Island study estimated that the incidence of sudden death among men under 30 during exercise is about 1 per 280,000 annually. A US Air Force study put the figure for a similar age group of young men at 1 per 735,000 young men per year.
In the USA a 1983-1993 study carried out by the National Center for Catastrophic Sports Injury Research identified 160 non-traumatic athlete deaths during high school and college organized sports. They also found that male athletes are five times as likely to experience non-traumatic deaths compared to female athletes (male deaths 7.47, female deaths 1.33 – per million athletes per year). A male college athlete has double the risk compared to a male high school athlete.
Even though the risk for older athletes is higher, it is still an extremely rare event. An estimate put the risk of death during exercise for healthy Seattle men aged 25-75 at 1 per 18,000. Another study estimated that the risk of death during jogging for Rhode Island people aged 30-64 was 1 in 7,620 for the period 1975-1980.
Clinical autopsy exams during the last 20 years in the USA have found that:
— Sudden deaths in younger athletes are most frequently linked to congenital cardiovascular structural abnormalities
— Sudden deaths in older athletes are most frequently linked to acquired atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. An older athlete is over 30.
Written by: Christian Nordqvist