Sudden cardiac death in young people.

consensus of opinion. Background Surveys of sudden death in England suggest that 3,500 unexpected sudden deaths occur per annum in the 16-64 age group. Of these the majority are due to c o ro n a ry art e ry disease but in 4.1% a coro n e r’s post-mortem is unable to find evidence of structural cardiac disease or significant drug exposure. The cause of death is therefore unascertainable. These cases have been referred to as sudden adult death syndrome or sudden unexpected death syndrome. More recently the term sudden arrhythmic death syndrome (SADS) has been suggested because those affected range in age from 4-65 years.