Shows w/ HCM

[EmilyOrange]

On this site we always talk about how the media doesn't do a fantastic job of publicizing HCM- It doesn't- but on two different episodes of Scrubs I saw them talk about patients with the disease. They did a decent job with the symptoms and everything.

Are there other shows that have HCM-related content that people just skim over or not? Just wondering!

[Annie S.]

I was watching an old ER a few days ago where they brought in a young athlete that had a sudden cardiac arrest. They did not mention HCM though. if I recall they referred to is as athletic heart and that was it. In fact I had a marathon of ER from season 1 through season 5 and of all the heart related issues, that was the only one. I don't know about any other shows.

[dkell88]

I know of the Er one as for other shows I do not know however there is a battery commercial where a basketball player is having a heart attack on the court which I believe is HCM.

[mbcube]

I remember a Six Feet Under about a young treadmill jogger dying but I don' recall anyone using the term HCM. I'll have to watch Scrubs more carefully.

[M&Mmom]

In Season 2 of One Tree Hill there were several episodes surrounding the father of the main characters, Lucas and Nathan, having HCM. Both of the boys live for basketball and the show covered that 50% of offspring may inherit the condition. The boys went to be tested and Lucas had HCM. The condition has been carried through other seasons covering medication, being removed from competitive sport play, disobeying the doctor's advice and consequently collapsing during play and being revived with AED, etc. Interestingly enough, Marissa had been watching this show before her diagnosis and it was one of the first references she made after finding out. We were wondering if maybe one of the writer's has HCM in their family.

[Cynaburst]

It was discussed on the board that one of the characters on Without a Trace, Vivian, has HCM and had a myectomy last season.

I am not sure if they called it a myectomy, but she had surgery.

[purple_ness1]

on shortland street a chezzy new zealand soap crigs brother dies from hcm and on mcleod daughters a auzze tv show tessa husband has it

[Cynaburst]

Last night we rented the Mike Leigh movie "All or Nothing." It seems that the overweight teenage son who suffers a "heart attack" during the course of the film might actually instead have HCM. The ER doctor tells the family that the son has a problem with the muscle that divides the chambers of his heart. They never use any technical terms at all, certainly not the word cardiomyopathy, and they don't say that sudden death is a possibility. They instead say that he will have to take a medication for the rest of his life and see a cardiologist regularly. Later on it is revealed that the doctor was making inquiries about family history and it turns out the father's family has alot of cardiac incidents to report. Nevertheless, it seems highly suspicious of HCM.

[lacheim]

I'm not entirely sure if Sit-coms and drama shows are exactly what we need to get the picture across to america. I think if we were to have a news station or something similar cover the disease, it would be understood better by the general population

[Reenie]

I was watching CSI the other night and they were doing an autopsy on a man who had died when his heart apparently just fibrillated and stopped all together. They commented on HCM, although not by name, but spoke of left-side thickness and septal thickening while they were looking for cause of death. In the end, the "corpse" had died of an electrical shock not heart related, but that had caused the arrhythmia.

[MissyH]

I was flipping through the channels the other night and caught the end of an episode from 2004 of Dr. G, Medical Examiner where a young man in his early 20's died while riding a bicycle. The finding was HCM and Dr. G explained a little bit about the disease as far as sudden death.

[ssavage69]

I thought I would add this one the movie "Beaches" with bett midler...I am not sure , but (this is not funny!) when i had to go to the emergency room a few weeks ago for palpataions the nurse in there said" oh, that is what the lady on the movie beaches had!" duh! made me feel so good , since she does die in it! I seen it was on the other day, but didn't check it out to see if she was right...lol

[Cynaburst]

Actually, what Barbara Hershey had on "Beaches" was a viral cardiomyopathy.

[krislawrence07]

House MD had it on there as well. It was the episode with the Marketing lady that had the leg twitch. Found out she was taking too much asprin and caused it. She of course had to have a heart transplant.