California - The heart of the matter
Thank you, California, for officially declaring HCM Awareness Day in your state!
Now the hcm act will help identify Cardiac Health issues in patients with a spectrum of Diseases including Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
Sudden cardiac death (SCD) is a sudden, unexpected death caused by loss of heart function (sudden cardiac arrest). Sudden cardiac death is the largest cause of natural death in the United States, causing about 325,000 adult deaths in the United States each year.
Multiple conditions and risks can make children prone to sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) or sudden cardiac death (SCD) as well as other complications of heart disease. To date, the focus has mainly been only on screening student-athletes.
The total population in the state of California is over 39 million people. Approximately 22.3% of this population are children.
Hear from California state constituents - We are more than numbers:
Anna is a board-certified music therapist, who was diagnosed with HCM at 5 months old and had an open heart surgical myectomy at 9 months old. Her father was diagnosed after her and later died from HCM when she was 8 years old. According to family members, "lots of people in their family died from some heart thing but they didn't know what it was".
There are approximately one million constituents per EACH State Senator's district. Like Anna, 32,000 of these constituents are potentially affected with cardiac disorders, with up to 5,000 having Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy*
Help save us now:
One of the cardiac disorders in the spectrum is Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy which is often misdiagnosed or worse yet - overlooked until it is too late.
HCM and many other cardiac diseases run in families. Scott P was diagnosed at 23 shortly after his father was diagnosed. Scott's own son witnessed when his ICD saved his life (shocked him 5 times within 94 seconds) while attending a little league game.
Scott was one of the lucky ones. But with more attention focused on this problem, we can improve the diagnosis delay.
There are approximately 500,000 constituents per EACH Assembly Member's district. Like Scott, there are up to 16,000 California constituents potentially affected with cardiac disorders, with up to 2,500 having Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy*
To view the full report on the prevalence of cardiac disorders in the state of California: Click Here
Please, listen to our patient stories, and take action to support the HCM Act. Draft legislation is available for review: https://4hcm.org/health-cardiac-monitoring-act/