TRENTON – Legislation sponsored by Senator Fred Madden (D – Gloucester, Camden) that would require the reporting of children’s sudden cardiac events and establish a statewide database to keep track of such information cleared the Senate Health, Human Services and Senior Citizens Committee today.
“The abundance of data that this registry can provide us will be helpful in so many different ways,” said Madden. “It is just one of the many ways I hope to bring attention to the very serious, very real issue of sudden cardiac arrest in our young people.”
The bill, S1911, also known as the “Children’s Sudden Cardiac Events Reporting Act,” would require a health care professional who makes the diagnosis of a sudden cardiac event in a child under 19 years old or who makes the actual determination and pronouncement of the death of a child, as applicable, to report the event to the Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS). It would establish the Children’s Sudden Cardiac Events Registry in DHSS. The registry would include a record of all sudden cardiac events reported and any other information that DHSS deems relevant and appropriate.
The bill is just one of several pieces of legislation Senator Madden has introduced that would seek to implement recommendations made by the New Jersey Student Athlete Cardiac Screening Task Force.
“The task force recommendations were a great first step, but we render them meaningless if we don’t move to act on them. I want to make these recommendations a reality, and I look forward to working with the Governor, my colleagues in the Legislature and members of the task force on this issue,” added Madden.
In 2009, the Legislature responded to growing concern over an increasing number of sudden deaths in student athletes by passing Senator Madden’s legislation establishing the task force. The task force was given the responsibility of studying, evaluating and developing recommendations relating to specific actionable measures to enhance screening of student athletes for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and other life-threatening cardiac conditions.
The bill now heads to the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee.