Student’s Death Blamed on Irregular Heartbeat

A Ventura seventh-grader who collapsed during gym class and died suffered from a rare irregular heartbeat, coroner’s officials said Thursday.

Ricardo Ramirez, 12, had a sudden cardiac arrhythmia Wednesday as he trotted out for a warmup run with other students at DeAnza Middle School, said Mike Feiler, senior deputy medical examiner in the Ventura County coroner’s office.

The condition causes the heart to pump so fast that it can’t fill with blood, starving the rest of the body of blood and leading to a collapse, he said.

Ricardo’s heart was slightly larger than normal for his age and size, indicating a possible viral or bacterial infection, Feiler said. Microscopic studies of the heart tissue over the next week will determine whether that was a factor, Feiler said.

The coroner’s office found no sign that the boy had been taking any medication or supplements, such as ephedrine, that might have caused the arrhythmia.