Hello, everyone, this is Debian. I cannot tell you how thrilled I
am to bring doctor unkit Shaw today. We are going to be covering a
lot of good topics for athletes and I want to share with you. Doctor
Unkitshaw is a sports cardiologist, and for young athletes, we don't even think
about the things that they need to focus on. So before we get started,
let's ask doctor un Kitshaw. So, doctor Shaw, can you share
with us what got you in that sports cardiology. Yeah, as I was
thinking about what I wanted to do, you know, I thought about merging
to my best interest, which was cardiology and athletes in sport and sports creology
was the perfect fit. I actually wrote crew in college, and unfortunately I
had a teammate who died suddenly at a cardia arrest after finishing first place,
and he was not able to be resuscitated. And so when we think about
young athletes, you know, unfortunately some of them are born with heart problems
or they have genetic heart disease. And so while they're some of the fittest,
healthiest looking people, they actually some of them have underlying heart disease.
And so this is a really nice field that helps sort of navigate both the
young athletes and the older athlete. And that's one of the things that we
don't think about because there are parents and I know so many of my friends
have young kids, and they think, like, you know, if you're
that cardiology is only for older people. So can you tell us, like,
you know, if you're whether you're a parent or a young athlete,
or if you're a young athlete yourself like you are in sports, So what
are the things that they can look out for? Yeah? Absolutely, I
mean, so one of the first things is dividing a little bit by age.
If you're less than thirty five, you're thinking about things that are going
to be something they're born with a genetic heart problem or a congenital heart problem,
and so signs and symptoms that you shouldn't ignore or chest pain, shortest
of breath, passing out, lightheadedness or dizziness. If you see all of
your other teammates are going and you always are the slowest. Organs have to
stop more or take more breaks and you can't keep up, that might be
a red flag. So the biggest thing is not sort of ignore symptoms.
Okay, so you mentioned about that, you know there may be some athletes
who may have congenital heart problems, but so many times because when they're young,
people don't even check for it. So you've talked about the symptoms.
So just as an athlete, especially like you know whether you're in college playing
D one division or any or like even if you're in high school or now
if you're in olympics or professionals, what could they do so that they know
that they do not have continital or they can rule it out. The best
thing and the biggest thing is going to see a primary care pedutrician every year
and making sure you go through the whole list of symptoms. They'll ask you
about your family history and be honest, if you're having symptoms, don't ignore
them. Let him or her nerve and they'll send you to cardiologists refer the
work up in certain scenarios and EKG or what your cardiogram can be indicated,
and that can pick up a lot a lot of the causes of sudden death
and athletes and this is such a specialty field. And as you talked about
looking at the symptoms, so can you share with us. I'm going to
go back to the first thing that you mentioned about your growing teammate as to
what happened, What mark did it leave on you? Yeah, I mean
that being at that age and losing a teammate, and obviously I mean having
someone who again you thought was extremely healthy and one of the fittest athletes in
our team, and for him to die suddenly, it's obviously profound and it
has, you know, impact, and this is part of my giving back
and just sort of learn and try to prevent another athlete from dying suddenly if
I can. And I know because you, as we have talked previously,
you were very young at that time, and such a loss can be prevented
for the most part. I mean, actually, this is a nice segue
into what we can do. And so sometimes, regardless of whatever screening you
do, cardiacoris will happen in young athletes or in older athletes, and so
being prepared is the best thing we can do. So emergency action planning,
which is like the defibrillators, having AEDs on the sidelines, in the practice
environments on the field is one of the best things that we can do.
Families and students should learn CPR. Ah that you brought up a really good
point that family and students should learn CPR. So what would you say,
is like the common practice nowadays? I mean, so American Heart Association has
like a two minute online hands only CPR video, So taking that, I
mean, the best thing would be actually getting a class and being certified,
but not everyone has to do that. So you can watch the American Heart
Association videos on hands only CPR and then learning how to use an AD.
They actually are auto made it and so even if you've never used it,
you shouldn't be nervous because when you turn it on and open it up,
it actually walks you through each step and says put the pads on the patient
that tells you to step away or to chart or you know, hit the
shock button. So it actually walks you through the whole process. So we
have not talked about the prevention. We have also talked about what you can
have on hand now as far as actually the concern, what can they do
in the day to day lives to keep their heart healthy. Yeah, I
mean, so we know that exercise is one of the best things you can
do to keep your heart healthy, and then everyone should be doing I mean
at least one hundred and fifty minutes a week of moderate exercise, which can
be brisk walking. The athletes that we see typically are doing way more than
that and biggerous exercise. And you know, I think the common risk misconception
is that you can eat and drink whatever you want if you're an athletic,
and so I see that all the time. But unfortunately those are risk factors,
and so I try to educate all my patients while my athletes on the
fact that you have to maintain the rest of your lifestyle also in a healthy
way. There's also this sense that if I an athlete, I don't have
any underlying medical problems. What we've seen and when we studied some of the
ultra runners from a local race, is that you know, about eighteen to
twenty percent of ultrarunners have a cardiac respector so don't ignore blood pressure, cholesterol,
diabetes, because all of that can be treated and should be treated regardless
if you're an athlete or not. No, that's you said it, like,
you know, Okay, I'm exercising, I don't have to pay attention.
So this brings home really a good point that it's important that how you're
living your life just because you're an athlete doesn't mean you stop there. You
take care of the rest of the life. Right. So, doctor Shane
know you've worked with a lot of professional leagues and professional teams. So can
you share with one of the teams that you work with and any story that
you may have that how you have helped athletes maintain not only the performance but
good hot health. Yeah, absolutely so. I mean locally when as part
of mens A health is actually cardiology for a lot of the local teams here
Baltimore Orioles, Washington Capitals, Baltimore Ravens And I am still the team cardiologist
for USA Swimming, the national team, and you know, athletes and taking
care of them is in a lot of different perspectives. This field is very
unique. So there's obviously the patient in front of you, where the athlete
comes in to see you with symptoms. But when you work with some of
these teams that are national, you know, I've gotten a phone call from
my colleagues who are on the field so to say, so to speak from
around the world, from different parts of Asia, when they had an athlete
who was an emergency room in Asia and they called me and said, he
is this the right plan? Should we be doing this and so you can
sort of help guide an athlete from around the world. And then more recently,
we had a tournament locally and there was an athlete who had seen a
cardiologist in London, had an issue locally, and so we connected virtually with
his cardiologists, with the athlete, with the athletic trainers. It's really a
full team sport, and we created a plan for him and we got his
heart procedure done the next day and he was back tennis two weeks later.
So it's really really nice. So that's fantastic that just because if you have
any issues doesn't mean that your career is over. Yeah, definitely not.
I mean there's a lot of things we can treat that if we find and
then hopefully be fully corrected and go back without much risk. One of the
things that we've learned is that you know, this whole engaging the patient and
having them be a little bit autonomous and so shared decision making. That we
try to engage the patient and say, hey, this is what we know,
but there's a lot that we don't know. We think potentially this is
a low risk condition and if you want to pursue it, we'll sort of
work with you and keep you as safe as possible. In certain scenarios,
we do think it's too high risk and we'd sort of recommend against competitive sport,
but we can still try to keep them active. Oh that's fantastic,
And you have mentioned about a lot of different values like, Okay, you
can do this, you can have these things, but what can they do
actively? So let's say if somebody, you know, any regular athlete,
were to come to you, so can you share, like, you know,
how do you take care of them and how do you help them with
their performance? Ye? I mean, it really depends on what they're coming
in with. So if it's an athlete who or someone who's just trying to
get started with activity and exercise, we world of recommend that they slowly build
up and engage with them. For people who are already try athletes, we
would put them through our testing or you know, based on their history and
make sure they're safe to continue and then you know, certain space on some
of the tests we do. We do part upon exercise testing. It can
provide them some data that they can then take back to their coaches and work
to sort of specify their training programs and a lot of our audience may be
thinking, you know, they have their athletes and they're thinking, Okay,
I know that doctor Chad's heart is in the right place because his wife's bigger
than who he is. He wants to give back to the community, and
think about it as young as he was in college. You're like eighteen nineteen
years old, and here you are petched by your teammates unexpected accidental demise,
and he is in here for their hearts. And as I have observed him,
I have observed doctor shall bring his heart and care to athletes. Can
you share that what would be different coming to you versus going to any other
place? Yeah, well, there's very few people that are Fellowship trained in
sports critology. But then bigger than that, I mean, I think you
know, I think you coming into this office, you'll know that we actually
genuinely care about your symptoms and want to work with you to either figure out
if there's something wrong or to make sure everything is okay. Your practice is
a little bit different in that we try to you know, we have a
lot of patience coming from out of town, and so we will try to
coordinate all of the testing same day. I'll review everything before you leave,
and so we'll have a plan at the end of the day or end of
the visit with what to do next or if everything looks okay to sort of
you know, recommend that you don't need any exercise restration. And you know,
in terms of the practice model itself, there's no phone trees. People
are into the phone, the appointment times are longer and not sort of hurried
and limited. Yeah, and as I know, you have athletes coming to
you from on around the country. So if you're an athlete, and or
if you're a parent of an athlete and want to have good performance and good
healthy life, and if you're looking and I don't about y'all, I know
for me it's important to have the right doctor, the right lawyer, the
right accountant, and you know, those people who are in your corner and
who will not only root for you, but who will uplift you and take
care. Then you will be the best hens of Doctor Shah. That what
I can tell you. And I've seen doctor Shaw over the years an amazing
care. You cannot find a better doctor than doctor Shaw. So if you're
there, definitely check it out and can you share with us website and where
people can find you. Oh, absolutely, and I'll say it's very common
for us to see second opinions as well. So a lot of people who've
seen one to two or three cardiologists and want to come in with all that
data and to review it and can you know, make sure everything was done
correctly or give you a different path. So our website is www dot Sports
and Performance Cardiology dot com and the phone number is two four oh eight nine
two seven zero seven zero. Well, thank you doctor Schelle for joining us
today and it was such a pleasure having this conversation, and thank you for
providing the nuggets. And you can listen and you can reach out and for
any other things of course, you can reach out to us as always.
You know we are here to support you at your service all the time.
See you next time, take care, Bye, Thank you,