Winter work leaves many in local emergency departments

More and more people tend to end up in local emergency departments as the snow hits the ground, from things like heart attacks, chest pain or back strains.

Shovelling the driveway could be enough to send someone to either St. Mary’s General Hospital or Grand River Hospital. The director of the cardiac program and critical care, Ala Qahwash, said it always ramps up this time of year.

“Like it or not shovelling is an exercise so we need to be aware of what we are doing and there’s a lot of things we can do to keep our hearts healthy and prevent heart disease,” said Qahwash.

“Being proactive, stretching, taking shifts, watching the size. Don’t twist, it’s always lift with your legs.”

He added that twisting with a heavy shovel full of snow can be a quick way to attain a significant back injury.

Things like normal routine exercise, eating healthy, not smoking, reducing stress, and maintaining a healthy weight can also help decrease the risk of heart attacks.

“Whether it’s chest pain or they’ve strained their back or their leg muscles because they’ve improperly shoveled their driveway, on a day like yesterday for example, that snow is heavy,” said Qahwash.