Fit for Duty: A Sober Reminder About Heart Health
by Greg Bowen, PCI #1227
Tarrant County College (TX) Police Department
IPMBA Industry Liaison
As public safety personnel, we are often subjected to long days with little or no physical activity. We respond to calls that get us stuck at a desk, completing paperwork. We get into the habit of frequenting the local fast food restaurant because it is convenient. We encounter incidents that can wear on us over time. We intervene in other people’s problems while being exposed to hazardous environments, viruses, verbal/physical assaults, and other threats. We are expected to respond swiftly, think clearly, run, jump, duck, dodge, and predict the actions of others, all while never making a mistake and always at risk of being criticized or judged.
Police officers have one of the poorest cardiovascular disease (CVD) health profiles of any occupation (Hartley, 2011). Our heart rates can go from “0 to 100” without warning. Policing is an occupation that requires unpredictable and stressful bursts of intense and strenuous physical activity, which places high demand on the cardiovascular system (Hartley, 2011 as cited in Kales, Tsismenakis, Zhang & Soteriades, 2009).
According to the Officer Down Memorial Page (http://www.odmp.org), 147 police officers died in the line of duty in 2019. Out of those 147, twenty-one died of heart attacks. I have tracked these statistics for the past few years and the number that have succumbed to heart attacks has remained fairly constant. I did not mention the 2020 count because I believe the numbers will be a bit skewed because of COVID-19.
Let’s look at what these officers were doing before they suffered their heart attacks.
Deputy U.S. Marshall Norman D. Merkel, U.S. D.O.J. U.S. Marshal’s Service: Died of a heart attack after participating in the department’s wellness program.
Deputy Sheriff Ray Elwin Horn III, Comal County SO, TX: Died of a heart attack after participating in his agency’s mandatory physical fitness testing.
Lieutenant Daniel Duane Hinton, Florida Highway Patrol, FL: Died of a heart attack while participating in a defensive tactics training exercise.
Sgt. Brian Keith Crain, Jenks PD, OK: Died of a heart attack after responding to several priority call of service during his shift. One call involved a domestic dispute with an uncooperative suspect.
Deputy Sheriff II Spencer Allen Englett, Forsyth County SO, GA: Suffered a traumatic medical event while participating in a training exercise.
Special Agent Liquat Ali “Leo” Khan, U.S. Army Criminal Inv. Division: Died of a heart attack while participating in his agency’s physical fitness test.
Officer Anthony Neri, Sanibel PD, FL: Died of a heart attack while participating in his agency’s physical agility testing.
Chief Wayne Mark Neidenberg, Lakeshire PD, MO: Died of a heart attack after assisting at the scene of a rollover vehicle accident.
Sgt. David Jones Fitzpatrick, The Colony PD, TX: Died of a heart attack after participating in the department’s wellness program.
Officer Steven James Brown, Port St. Lucie PD, FL: Died of a heart attack after completing a third day of leading the department’s Police Athletic League’s Police Camp.
Detective April Eleanor Bird, Asbury Park PD, NJ: Died of a heart attack while conducting a shooting investigation.
Conservation Officer Shannon Lee “Opie” Barron, Red Lake Nat. Conv., MN: Died of a heart attack while investigating an illegal harvesting call.
Deputy Sheriff Carlos Cammon, Orange County SO, CA: Died of a “duty related illness”. He collapsed during a SWAT training exercise.
Deputy Sheriff Jose Luis Blancarte, Kinney County SO, TX: Died of a heart attack at the scene of a vehicle fire.
Deputy Sheriff Christopher Michael Hulsey, Meade County SO, KY: Died of a heart attack after a struggle with a suspect while executing a search warrant.
Border Patrol Agent Robert Mark Hotten, U.S. Customs and Border Protection: Died of a heart attack while attempting to locate a group of suspected illegal aliens.
Capt. Albert E. Torres, Los Angeles Dept. of Recreation and Parks, CA: Died of a heart attack after completing a fourteen-hour shift patrolling the areas affected by the Saddleridge Fire.
Sgt. Joseph Brian Mantijo, Chattanooga PD, TX: Died of a heart attack as a complication of heat exhaustion after processing a crime scene.
Officer Kenneth Dale Foley, Lakeland PD, FL: Died of a heart attack after responding to a robbery and taking a suicidal suspect with a knife into custody. Officer Foley was later found unconscious in his patrol vehicle by his fellow officers, who were unable to revive him.
Chief Deputy Bobby Wayne Jacobs, Knott County SO, KY: Died of a heart attack after handling a call for service. This was the day after he served a warrant on a barricaded subject.
Officer Jose Humberto Meza, Burnett PD, TX: Died of a heart attack after extensive training with his K-9 partner, Kuso.
This is only a list of those who died of heart attacks in the line of duty. It does not include those law enforcement officers who had heart attacks after going on a bike ride, playing catch with their kids in the back yard, fishing, climbing a flight of stairs, or watching the Dallas Cowboys lose another game. I have not found any statistics on off-duty heart attack deaths, but I imagine these numbers would be quite high.
I was surprised at how many law enforcement officers died of heart attacks during or after physical fitness testing or department training. IPMBA Instructors and other trainers: please use some form of pre-physical activity evaluation such as the Get Active Questionnaire (GAQ; formerly the Physical Activity Readiness Questionnaire, or PAR-Q). Pay attention to your trainees and watch for signs of distress. You know cops; they don’t want to admit they are hurting.
Just because you are a bike patrol officer doesn’t automatically mean you are getting adequate exercise. Yes, it is better than doing nothing, but we can all do more. Maintaining a healthy diet is just as important as exercise.
Let’s learn something from these twenty-one law enforcement officers. You do not have to have the fitness or the discipline of an Olympic athlete to do this job, but you can’t be sedentary. Recognize the health challenges of our profession and combat these challenges by participating in a healthier lifestyle.
References
Bartelme, Ed. “How Cycling Saved my Life”. IPMBA News 2018, Vol. 27, No. 3.
Hartley, Tara A., et al. “Health disparities in police officers: comparisons to the U.S. general population.” International Journal of Emergency Health. Vol. 13,4 (2011): 211-20.
Kales SN, Tsismenakis AJ, Zhang C, Soteriades ES. “Blood pressure in firefighters, police officers, and other emergency responders”. American Journal of Hypertension. 2009 Jan; 22(1):11-20.
Officer Down Memorial Page, www.odmp.org.
Greg has been in law enforcement for 26 years and is currently serving as a Captain with the Tarrant County College District Police Department in Fort Worth, Texas. He was co-host for the 2019 IPMBA Conference in Fort Worth. Greg is his department’s bike unit coordinator, a member of the TCC Special Response Unit, and Advanced SWAT, TCOLE, and firearms instructor. He has been an IPMBA member since 2006 and was certified as IPMBA PCI #1227 in 2011. He was elected to the IPMBA Board in 2020 and appointed to the position of Industry Liaison. He is an avid cyclist, a home brewer, and enjoys wood-working and just being outside. He can be reached at gbowen185@yahoo.com.
(c) 2020 IPMBA. This article appeared in the 2020 Board Issue of IPMBA News.