According to CNN the Bills released a statement that it was a cardiac arrest
“Damar Hamlin suffered a cardiac arrest following a hit in our game versus the Bengals,” the statement said. “His heartbeat was restored on the field and he was transferred to the UC Medical Center for further testing and treatment. He is currently sedated and listed in critical condition.”
The Bills just tweeted that it was a heart attack.
From CNN’s reporting:
“Damar Hamlin suffered a cardiac arrest following a hit in our game versus the Bengals,” the statement said. “His heartbeat was restored on the field and he was transferred to the UC Medical Center for further testing and treatment. He is currently sedated and listed in critical condition.”
Not to derail the topic, but if the game is simply skipped and not resumed down the schedule, do the Bills and Bengals just each go into the playoffs as if the game never happened? That would have major playoff implications (for instance, it would likely give Kansas City the No. 1 seed.)
I would guess that league execs are having an all nighter to figure out their options regarding just that.
Just to nitpick, heart attack is a nonspecific term but often is used to refer to a cardiac episode caused by blood flow compromise to the heart. A cardiac arrest is anything that can cause the heart to stop which includes blockage of blood flow but also trauma to the heart and rhythm disturbances . The two terms are used interchangeably but what he suffered was a cardiac arrest most likely caused by arrhythmia caused by the blow to his chest. In other words, I suspect that they will not find any blockages in his heart which is a good prognostic sign for recovery. If he truly got immediate effective CPR followed by rapid cardio version on the field ( which is what seemed to have happened) then he may recover fully.
And I am an awful person but I did wonder if the fans will get a refund.
I shan’t link to them, but of course, there are people suggesting that the COVID vaccine played a part in his collapse. Idiots.
I will speculate the game will be restarted from where it stopped, at the same stadium, and everyone with a ticket will be allowed back in. When that happens is the big question. I am sure there is some cold calculation going on by the league and hoping that happens this week, before next Sunday’s games, so 1) everyone knows what the standings are, and 2) so the league can get it’s season back on track. Of course, all of that is lesser in importance than Hamlin’s health, so it all depends on how thing go for him.
There are people who suggest a car crash is caused by the COVID vaccine.
my first thought was aortic aneurism, then when they were able to get his heart going, i moved to impact stoppage. usually they get the wind knocked out of them, not a heart stop. if it turns out to be an impact, that is a lot of unfortunate things lining up just right.
i hope that he is able to recover completely.
I thought the MNF crew did an outstanding job covering this, but especially Ryan Clark.
Also worth mentioning … Hamlin’s toy drive charity has received more than $3 million in donations since last night.
There’s a long differential diagnosis for sudden cardiac arrest/cardiac death in young athetes, covered here.
They’ve wasted no time promoting their pet theory. Among the antivax ghouls jumping on the bandwagon are Charlie Kirk, right-wing activist and talk show host, and multimillionaire “tech bro” Steve Kirsch, who’s using Substack to spread his brand of garbage.
*note that while antivaxers want us to believe that young athletes keeling over on the playing field is unprecedented, the above linked review was published in 2019, before the pandemic and release of Covid-19 vaccines.
I commented on this in a Pit thread, so you can go over there and spew decorum-free about these jerks.
a doctor interviewed on cnn, thinks it may have been a traumatic brain injury that caused a heart arrhythmia. he said he went frame by frame, and believes that hamlin jaw impacted and pushed his head back, causing a brain injury. a bit like a very hard upper cut. that could involve veins, arteries, and brain stem…
I was an EMT for about 8 years before a back injury forced me to give it up. In that time, I went on countless cardiac arrests and brain injuries. Never once did we have access to anything that would allow us to measure brain activity. The paramedics that I worked with never had access to do so, either. At least not on any run that I also responded to.
It just wasn’t in our training protocols. It’s possible that other states have portable EEG machines in their ambulances, but we did not.
I know it was a fluke injury, and he had medical attention right away, but there’s no way I’d set foot on a football field again in my life.
It is unlikely Damar Hamlin ever will. He might be up and around in a week or two, but I will be surprised if he’s ever cleared to play football again.
Just saw on Facebook (no link) that the game won’t be resumed this week, and that there are currently no plans to resume it.
Official statement from Goodell:
Smart move. There’s no way they can play it today, and playing tomorrow makes the Week 18 game way too short of rest to play on. At least this way there’s a possibility of playoff implications resolving themselves, making the Bills/Bengals game irrelevant (I think - at least a Bills loss to NE and KC winning would resolve #1 and #2 seeds, and I think the Bengals/Ravens game resolves the AFC North).
I wonder how many tone-deaf fans will whine about this, especially if it has some hypothetical impact on the postseason.