Caregiver’s Toolbox Ep. 19 “Marathons, Heart Attacks and Seniors”
Caregiver’s Toolbox Ep. 19 “Marathons, Heart Attacks and Seniors”
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Ryan:
Hello everybody. And welcome to the caregivers’ toolbox podcast. Tools to help you with everyday caregiving. My name is Ryan McKenna, the owner of men and women home care. And today we’re talking about marathons and seniors.
Hello, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the caregivers’ toolbox. Tools for everyday care giving, here we give you tips, education and information on senior care topics. And today alongside Janet, we’re going to be talking about a big event in Massachusetts and specifically the Boston area called the Boston marathon. Now there aren’t too many senior citizens that are running in this thing, but there are some, but we’re talking about an unexpected consequence of having a marathon in your city. And then today we’re talking about how heart attack death rates go up in spike because of marathons in any major city that they’re held. What do you think about this, Janet?
Janet:
I was surprised when you first mentioned it, but it does make sense. I mean, you think that Boston from Hopton to Boston just gets taken over by the world on that day.
Ryan:
Absolutely. So people that aren’t aware of what we’re talking about, something that came over the internet today that I saw that I was very interested in was that a study came out through a professor at the Harvard Medical School that had looked at more than 12,000 decades worth of heart attack and hospitalizations more than 12,000. And specifically for Medicare patients along route of 11 major marathons, including Boston. And what she found was somebody that is hospitalized on race days, 13 to 15% higher chance of having, 13 to 15% higher mortality rate compared to somebody in identical days of the week or surrounding weeks post and previous to the roadblocks during the marathons that are being held. And it just seemed like obviously an unintended consequence, but it just shows you how everything’s connected in this world, right?
Janet:
Yeah. A healthy event. Is a health risk to people that aren’t the runners.
Ryan:
No granted, this isn’t cause to get up in arms and end a marathon or anything like that, it just happens to be an extremely unlucky day for the people or an unlucky 48 hours for the people that have a heart attack. But the point being is that the problem ends up being that ambulances can get to and from the person having the heart attack to the hospitals in Boston, as easily as they could. An ambulance trip before noon on race day was more than 16 minutes or 32% longer than non race days. And when we’re dealing with heart attacks or really any type of emergency, time is of the essence. Right?
Janet:
Absolutely. I wonder in this study was, how long ago was this study done?
Ryan:
I don’t have it in front of me right now, but obviously this came across my desk literally a few hours ago. So this study must be somewhat recent. I’m thinking I’m looking at it right now, trying to say what it says, but at this point in time, I just don’t know when the study was done.
Janet:
Okay. My only reason for asking is this is a national survey that or study that they did, right. It wasn’t just Boston?
Ryan:
No, this was a decade’s worth of heart attacks among 12,000 that were in 11 major cities that had US marathons. So it’s not just a couple it was published in the New England Journal of Medicine. So I don’t know when that publishing was done, but I’m willing to bet that I can find out pretty quickly when it was done. So it’s just a Horton unintended consequence of having something like this. Let me look it up on my computer.
Janet:
Yeah. I mean, I can think of times when you take your life in your hands, just trying to get across the street as a pedestrian during the marathon. And then of course, everybody thinks of heartbreak kill. They think of the runners that are wearing out. You don’t think of an elderly person. And yet I know from clients, I knew of at VNAs that they’re basically trapped in their house for the day. They couldn’t get out of their driveway. Family can’t get into visit, so that can put anxiety up there too. So I would think it’s almost like preparing for a snowstorm, even though it’s probably a sunny day.
Ryan:
Absolutely. This looking at the New England Journal of Medicine, this was published on the 13th of this month. So today’s the 14th. So it was yesterday. So this came out very recently.
Janet:
That’s pretty recent.
Ryan:
But I mean most people in the Boston area or a lot of people in the Boston area do have Monday off, because it’s Patriots day, which is a Massachusetts holiday, it’s marathon Monday. So even on top of that, there are all the schools, it’s school vacation week as well. So…
Janet:
I think The Red Sox always play that day at home too.
Ryan:
Absolutely. So the majority, maybe not the majority, but there is a good portion of Massachusetts that’s closed and people are at home. So if you have a family member that is in the area that is going to in the Boston area or Hopton to Massachusetts, it might be a great day to pick them up on Sunday night and say, Hey, let’s spend Monday together and drop them off Monday night when they’re clearing everything up, just in case if an emergency does occur, then you know that you’re out in Concord or down in Brockton or up in the North shore. And the hospitals are ready to go. Because in this article it was saying that it’s not just… especially after the bombing that occurred a few years ago, but all the hospitals in the vicinity increase their staff because you have such an influx of tourists and pedestrians that otherwise wouldn’t be in downtown Boston coming in.
There are thousands of more police officers, EMTs and medical professionals are available as volunteers, just in case people get heat stroke, whether they’re again a viewer, or an actual runner, or anybody that’s down there. So it’s not like the hospitals are just saying, eh, we’re, we’ll be okay. And we’ll just close down for the day. They’re actually…
Janet:
They’re to go.
Ryan:
… [crosstalk 00:06:55] People they’re they’re staffed and ready to go. But what it’s really showing is that these ambulance rides are so important to the mortality rate of these victims of heart attacks, that there is a major difference whether you survive or don’t on marathon Monday or a marathon whatever day it is in your city or town.
Janet:
Wow. Well now that we’re talking about this, I can remember there had been an article, about when they were having a political convention in Boston, and there was a whole big to do with the hospitals that they were concerned because we have certain dignitaries in the city, you close off roads and they wanted to know how they were going to get from wherever into the major hospitals, because they were right near the Convention.
Ryan:
Absolutely. Think about the Olympics that they wanted in Boston.
Janet:
Absolutely.
Ryan:
And what that would’ve done to all the roads and all the nonsense that would’ve occurred from that…
Janet:
People could have drive to New Hampshire.
Ryan:
… Probably would be. So, if you’re listening to this it’s marathon Tuesday, it’s the day after the marathon. So we didn’t want to spend a whole 15 minutes on this, but we thought it was interesting enough to bring it up. It was obviously a timely study that came out. I’m sure there’s no coincidence that came out on the Thursday before the marathon. Right. But it’s just interesting. And something to think about that if you have a loved one in the area that maybe it’s a good day to pick them up and drop them off and make sure that every things safe with them.
Janet:
Yeah. Good day to have plans, not just in snowstorms.
Ryan:
Absolutely. Well, have a great day and thank you very much for listening to the caregivers’ toolbox. Tools for everyday caregiving, our episodes come out every Tuesday, thank you for listening.
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