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Firefighters and Cardiac Screening


Guest UVAPAC

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Guest UVAPAC

I was just wondering if any cardiology PA-C's out there have advice on screening firefighters for heart disease.  (http://www.cvriskcalculator.com/)  Is this a reasonable tool to screen with?  If so, what percentage would you consider "too high" and refer to cardiology for stress test?  

Thank you for the input.  

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Not a cardiology PA - I do EM, but 35+ years in the fire service.  There's a disclaimer on the web site that "Unfortunately, there is insufficient data to reliably predict risk for those less than 40 years of age".  Most career firefighters are able to retire by their late 40's based on typical pension systems, so I doubt this tool would be applicable for many.  Most of those folks tend to gravitate to slower stations in their later years just by the nature of the profession.

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Guest UVAPAC
On 5/12/2018 at 12:04 AM, ohiovolffemtp said:

Not a cardiology PA - I do EM, but 35+ years in the fire service.  There's a disclaimer on the web site that "Unfortunately, there is insufficient data to reliably predict risk for those less than 40 years of age".  Most career firefighters are able to retire by their late 40's based on typical pension systems, so I doubt this tool would be applicable for many.  Most of those folks tend to gravitate to slower stations in their later years just by the nature of the profession.

The vast majority of the fire fighter examinations I perform are for volunteer fire departments.  We see a very large population of interior firefighters between the ages of 40-65.  Our department is talking about making 8% cardiac risk in the next 10 years grounds for a stress test.  The only issue is, I think 85% of the volunteer firefighters will be going to stress tests.

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