At the tender age of 10, Scarlett Hack began to notice troubling signs such as shortness of breath and heart palpitations. Initially, these symptoms were attributed to anxiety, a condition she was already battling. However, her parents, not content with this explanation, sought out multiple medical opinions until an echocardiogram finally provided some clarity.

The tests revealed that Scarlett was suffering from hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a genetic disorder characterized by the thickening of the heart muscle. Remarkably, the condition seemed to have appeared spontaneously in her, as no other family members had any history of it.

“The heart disease was spontaneous in me. My entire family doesn’t have any record of it, only me,” Scarlett shared with 9news.com.au. This revelation was a shock, leading her parents to a doctor’s advice that was both sobering and urgent: “You should learn CPR as this has no cure.”

“The heart disease was spontaneous in me. My entire family doesn’t have any record of it, only me,” she told 9news.com.au. 

“After the doctor’s appointment, my parents were told by the doctor, ‘You should learn CPR as this has no cure’.”

Hack’s symptoms only worsened over the next three years until she was diagnosed with a second heart disease called arrhythmia burden disease – the time the heart spends in abnormal rhythm.

She fainted often, which caused her heart to stop each time, and eventually had an internal defibrillator installed.

During a doctor’s appointment, her heart started racing and she went into cardiac arrest.

“I was screaming to my dad, ‘Don’t let me die, don’t let me die’,” she said.

”It was very traumatising.”

Hack was in cardiac arrest for 40 minutes and then put on life support.

Her parents had two choices: let her go or wait for a heart donor.

“I only had two weeks to get it. If not, I’d be declared brain dead,” she said.

“On the eighth day, my parents got the call at 2am, and they had a heart for me, and then I went into surgery at 7am.”

Now aged 18, Hack is studying nursing so she can care for other children who may be in the same position she was in.

New data by the Heart Research Institute found 144,000 Australians are living with a deadly heart disease, which claims nine lives and causes 170 hospitalisations each day.

Of those who survive heart failure, 65 per cent return to the emergency department within a year. 

Heart Research Institute chief executive Andrew Coats said many people were unaware their heart was failing to pump blood and oxygen around the body as it should.

“Heart disease can affect any one of us,” he said.

“For too many Australians, it strikes without warning, taking the lives of loved ones far too soon.”

Part of the issue is awareness.

Hack urged anyone with symptoms of heart disease to get themselves checked. 

“There’s no harm in you getting checked out by a doctor,” she said.

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