Medicalising sport will yield unintended results

doi:10.1136/bmj.a909

Published 22 July 2008, doi:10.1136/bmj.a909
Cite this as: BMJ 2008;337:a909

Letters

Death in young athletes

Medicalising sport will yield unintended results

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

What an extraordinary suggestion: that we should medicalisesport and prevent involvement of those with suspicious findings.¹Have Drezner and Khan not noticed that we are living in an epidemicof obesity?

Obviously the prevention of sudden death is laudable, but howmany people will be put off sporting involvement by the conceptof its dangerous nature, and the cost and inconvenience entailedin getting medical investigation? Those on the periphery ofinvolvement particularly, one assumes.

Furthermore, are we to prevent the sporting involvement of thosewith risk factors for ischaemic heart disease—such assmokers and people with hypercholesterolaemia? And does playingfootball with your children in the park count as sport? It seemssurprising that the Italians have accepted it; but it is easyto frighten people about their hearts and the screening argumentis superficially attractive.

The Italian approach, which clearly fails many of Wilson’sscreening criteria, is . . . [Full text of this article]

Laurie R Davis, general practitioner principal

¹ South Hermitage Surgery, South Hermitage, Shrewsbury SY3 7JS

lauriedavis@doctors.org.uk