13th International Congress
THE "NEW FRONTIERS"
OF ARRHYTHMIAS 1998

January 24-31, 1998
Marilleva, Trento, Italy

RT-218

Ventricular arrhythmias in athletes: markers of subclinical heart disease

Alessandro Biffi, Luisa Verdile, Giovanni Caselli, Fernando Maria Di Paolo, Fredrick Fernando, Antonio Spataro, Antonio Pelliccia, Paolo Di Renzi**, Gerardo Ansalone*, Fabrizio Ammirati*, Claudio Pandozi*, Massimo Santini*.
Department of Medicine, Institute of Sports Science, CONI, *Department of Heart Disease, San Filippo Neri Hospital, **Department of Radiology, Fatebenefratelli-Isola Tiberina Hospital, Rome, Italy

Introduction

In young patients, subclinical cardiomyopathies can present as sudden death, particularly during exercise and competitive sports^1-3. Frequently, the initial presentation is ventricular ectopic beats (VEB) or non sustained ventricular tachycardia (NSVT). Therefore, early identification of myo-cardial disease in athletes with VEB and NSVT is the main point of a pre-participation cardiovascular screening. The aim of this study was to value the presence of underlying pathologic conditions such as cardiomyopathy or arrhythmogenic right ventricular dysplasia in a population of athletes with ventricular arrhythmias in absence of apparent structural heart disease versus a control group of athletes without arrhythmias.