News & Events

Heart of a Champion Day Adds New Location for 2011

Fort Mill Screening – May 14
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools Screening -- June 4
Union County Screening – June 11

CHARLOTTE, NC -- Heart of a Champion Day, a free athletic screening for high school students, will expand in 2011, adding Fort Mill High School and Nation Ford High School, both in the Fort Mill (S.C.) School District.

The new location will join screenings for Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools (CMS) high school athletes that began in 2008 and a similar program in Union County that launched last year.

The screenings will check for heart abnormalities that could lead to sudden death and may include an electrocardiogram and echocardiogram.  Neither heart test is offered during a routine athletic screening.  Also included are orthopedic and general medical screenings.  Last year, more than 1,200 CMS and Union County student-athletes participated and 80 were found to have medical conditions that required follow-up.  Organizers expect to screen more than 3,500 student-athletes at all three locations this year. 

Carolinas Medical Center-Pineville, CMC Sports Medicine, Levine Children’s Hospital, Sanger Heart & Vascular Institute and OrthoCarolina will sponsor the Fort Mill screening, which will be held on May 14 at CMC-Fort Mill Medical Plaza, 704 Gold Hill Road, in Fort Mill, S.C. 

The fourth annual Heart of a Champion Day for CMS students will take place on June 4 and will again be held at Carolinas College of Health Sciences, 1200 Blythe Blvd., on the Carolinas Medical Center campus.  Sponsors are CMC, CMC Sports Medicine, Levine Children’s Hospital, Sanger Heart & Vascular Institute and OrthoCarolina.

The Union County screening will be held on June 11 at Union West Medical Plaza, 6030 W. Highway 74, in Indian Trail, N.C., and will include high school students in Union and Anson counties in North Carolina, and Chesterfield County in South Carolina.  Sponsors are CMC-Union, CMC Sports Medicine, Levine Children’s Hospital, Sanger Heart & Vascular Institute and OrthoCarolina.  Heart checks will be conducted inside MED-1, CMC’s mobile hospital. 

Participants in all three screenings may register online by visiting www.heartofachampionday.org and clicking on the “STUDENTS” tab at the top of the page.  Registration is now open for Fort Mill students and will close on April 29.  CMS students may register online from May 2 through May 27, and Union County registration runs from May 9 through June 6.  

Awareness of sudden cardiac death among high school athletes continues to grow due to media coverage of high-profile cases, including a Michigan high school basketball player who recently collapsed and died shortly after sinking the winning basket in a game. 

The three main genetic defects that doctors look for during the cardiac screenings are:

Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy -- A thickening of the heart muscle that causes electrical disruptions and reduced blood flow, sometimes causing sudden death.  This genetic disorder affects one in 500 people and can be treated with medication and, in serious cases, surgery.

Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome – A heart abnormality that causes irregular, rapid heart beats and can be cured by a surgical procedure.

Long Q-T Interval Syndrome – A hereditary disorder of the heart’s electrical rhythm that reduces blood flow and can cause fainting.  In severe cases, a prolonged heart spasm could result in death.  This disorder can be treated with medication or an implantable defibrillator.