Original articlePreservation of Ventricular Function in Amateur Athletes After Completion of a Marathon
Section snippets
Data Collection and Patient Recruitment
This study was approved by our institutional review board. Informed consent was obtained from each participant before enrolling in the study.
In all, 51 participants training for the 2001 Chicago Marathon were recruited and enrolled in the study from Chicago-area running groups, including the Chicago Area Runners Association and local running stores. Exclusion criteria included pregnancy, known cardiovascular disease, and use of any cardiovascular drug. In all, 45 participants successfully
Results
In all, 45 participants (26 men, 19 women; age 24-55 years, average age 35 ± 8 years) successfully completed the marathon and underwent all 3 echocardiograms (Table 1). The mean marathon completion time was 4 ± 0.7 hours. All participants were without documented cardiovascular disease and the majority was of a normal body habitus. The total number of runners in the marathon was 29,185, of which 28,703 finished the race. The average finish time was 4:19:28 hours, which is similar to the average
Discussion
We have demonstrated the preservation of ventricular function in a moderately large group of participants after completion of a marathon.
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Supported in part by a grant from the unrestricted funds of the Division of Cardiology, Department of Medicine, Feinberg School of Medicine, and a Scientist Development Grant from the American Heart Association (Drs Rigolin and Seghatol).