Revere High School has partnered with Mobile Cardiac Overview and Risk Evaluation (mCORE) to provide students and student athletes with heart screenings.

Based in central Ohio, mCORE is a program consisting of eight members who have all been affected by Sudden Cardiac Arrest or Sudden Cardiac Death (SCA/SCD).  The program offers heart screenings to students and student athletes who could be at risk of SCA or SCD.  The heart screenings mCORE offers cost about $75, compared to screenings given in similar hospital procedures that can cost $2,500.  As more neighboring schools partnered with mCORE, such as Hoban, Copley, Kent, Medina, Parma, Solon and Wadsworth, Revere athletic director Bill Conley brought the idea to the high school’s executive staff.  Conley explained why he presented the idea of partnering with mCORE.

“More high schools are [partnering] . . . which shows the validity of mCORE… Many of the surrounding schools partnered [with mCORE]. It’s more of a preventative type [of program] . . . It’s mainly to keep our students and student athletes safe,” Conley said.

Matthew Montgomery, superintendent of the Revere Local Schools District, described the program and explained Revere’s goals in partnering with mCORE.

“[mCORE is] a service that screens students and student athletes for abnormalities [with the heart] . . . [Revere hopes to] reduce the risk of students going into Sudden Cardiac Arrest,” Montgomery said.

Chad Ogden mCORE director of partnership development, explained the premise of mCORE.

“[Our premise is to] prevent Sudden Cardiac Arrest… We use EKG’s and ECHO’s to do the screenings… EKG’s run a 8%-10% false positive or false negative result… this is too high so we adopted the ECHO and use both,” Ogden said.

An EKG (electrocardiogram) and an ECHO (echocardiogram) are screenings that help identify problems with the heart muscle, valves, or rhythm.  This is an ultrasound of a heart that uses high-frequency sound waves to take a picture of internal organs.

Ogden explained mCORE’s purpose at the state level and voiced their desire to expand.

“[We have partnered with] a little over a hundred schools in Ohio, we are expanding south now . . . our main goal is to cover all of Ohio.”  Ogden said.

The heart screenings took place on Friday, December 4 in the high school.  A total of twenty-three students participated in the screenings.  Revere plans to begin doing these screenings several times every year.