In a Heartbeat
“John/Jack Mazur RPh, is the Vice President of The Emilee Connection Inc. He is also a father, pharmacist, podcast host, eating disorder and mental health advocate, who is witty, kind, and who has a very soft spot for his three dogs.”
As the calendar year changed from 2022 to 2023, everyone hoped the New Year would be a better one for the world. That always seems to be the wish as we say goodbye to the old year and ring in the new one.
We have all heard the saying, “Your world can change in a heartbeat.” Two days into the new year, we witnessed this happen to someone else.
On January 2,2023, over 65,000 fans packed into Paycor Stadium, the home of the Cincinnati Bengals, and began to watch a much-anticipated Monday night football game between the Bengals and the Buffalo Bills.
At 8:55 PM, Damar Hamlin, a player for the Bills, collapsed, and fell to the ground. The eyes of fans in the stands, the announcers, and those watching on television, were glued on the field as the players, coaches, and medical staff attended to Damar. It became apparent very quickly that this was not a typical injury that had caused the Bills player to fall to the ground.
We soon learned a trainer was working on Damar. My wife asked, “Has his heart had stopped beating? Oh my God, Is he alive?”
I stared at the television in disbelief. I did not know the answer.
While this was happening, we watched the players, coaches, and fans as they cried, embraced one another, and prayed in silence. I’ m sure they were all praying the same prayer. Please let Damar be okay.
This football game that meant so much to so many, was suddenly meaningless.
The medical personnel on the field, along with the trainers, EMT’s and the hospital’s physicians and staff were all trained to administer the proper treatment to save lives in emergency situations.
And the prayers were answered!
I am writing this, two weeks after the game. Damar is home. His heart is beating every beat, and he is doing amazingly well, with no apparent permanent neurological damage.
Emergency situations happen every day, and most are not broadcasted on national television in front of millions of viewers. They happen to families like yours and mine, who cry, and pray that their loved one will get help like Damar did, from medical personnel, educated and trained for emergency situations, so they won’t die.
So, what’s my point of sharing this on this blog on The Emilee Connection, a non-profit started to increase awareness, and education about eating disorders and offer peer support for adults who suffer with them, and for the families and friends of those same adults.
We live in a medical system of specialists. If you have heart problems, you are treated by a cardiologist, like Damar was at the hospital. If you have cancer, you are treated by an oncologist. Skin problems? You go to a dermatologist. Doctors specialize in particular areas because there is so much to learn about the human body, diseases, and illnesses. With this knowledge the patient can receive optimum care.
When someone has an eating disorder, it is very difficult to find physicians, therapists and dietitians who specialize in treating them. This is even more difficult when that person searching for treatment is an adult.
I have learned that doctors receive little or no training in medical school about eating disorders, or afterward, during their residency. This maxim holds true for all medical professionals: nurses, therapists, social workers, psychologists etc. They receive little or no training about eating disorders when they are in college or medical school.
We live in a world of approximately 70 million people, who at some point in their life, will suffer from an eating disorder. Almost 30 million of those individuals live here in the United States.
Eating Disorders are serious, biologically based illnesses that are never a choice. Anorexia has a mortality rate of twenty percent. In this country, someone dies every 52 minutes as the direct result of an eating disorder. The fact that doctors are not trained to deal with or specialize to help these patients, is inconceivable to me.
For a dad, a mom, and a brother, who’s hearts were shattered and whose worlds were changed forevermore at 6:20 am, on August 19, 2016, when our daughter Emilee, lost her battle with anorexia.
We have made it our passion and mission, to increase the awareness of these insidious illnesses, demand more education of the medical community, advocate for more insurance coverage, and more affordable treatment for eating disorders. You should not have to be wealthy to be healthy.
As Emilee grew sicker, people who saw her at the bank, post office or grocery store, assumed her frail look was because she had cancer. I have heard some people with anorexia say they wish they had cancer. Then at least, they would be cared for by a doctor and clinicians trained to understand their disease and who would have experience and specialized knowledge to better help them. Then an insurance company would not deny them treatment that might save or at least prolong their life. And then society would have compassion for them and not judge them for being sick or if they experience a relapse.
As with any disease, early intervention and treatment are essential, to prevent the disease from progressing. Emilee reached out for residential treatment when she realized her eating disorder was becoming serious. Unfortunately, she did not receive the treatment she needed early on, because an insurance company decided she wasn’t sick enough. Early intervention should be the norm. Eventually, her disease metastasized, just like a cancer. Her anorexia nervosa became what they call, Severe Enduring Anorexia Nervosa. And it ultimately took her life.
Everyone deserves to be treated by specialists in the field of the disease affecting the patient. That includes children and adults with eating disorders. Early intervention saves lives for all diseases. Unfortunately, many adults with eating disorders did not receive treatment when they were young or did not receive the essential levels of care at that time, or they developed the disease as an adult and have fallen through the cracks of our current medical system. Adults with eating disorders encounter even more stigma and shame for having an eating disorder which makes reaching out for help even more difficult.
Like all of you, I am so happy that Damar Hamlin is alive, that his family, friends, and team members, and all those involved in his medical care, can breathe a sigh of relief.
I just wish Emilee was still here.
And that 27 families a day were not grieving the loss of their loved one, because another person has died as the direct result of an eating disorder. That is happening every 52 minutes.
We need to fill in the cracks of our healthcare system, especially the mental health system. And we must demand lifesaving changes in 2023. We must come together as people, and as eating disorder organizations—large and small.
Jack Mazur RPh