Medical Student, 28, Dies of Cardiac Arrest After Collapsing During Basketball Game

• Brenan Cullimore died on March 7 from cardiac arrest after collapsing during a basketball game
• The 28-year-old suffered from a rare genetic heart condition called Brugada syndrome but wasn’t properly educated on how it impacted his health
• His wife Abby Cullimore is now sharing his devastating story to raise awareness of Brugada syndrome

A medical student died of cardiac arrest due to a rare genetic condition, and now his wife is sharing his story in hopes of raising awareness.

On Wednesday, March 5, Brenan Cullimore was playing a pick-up game of basketball with his friends. The 28-year-old suddenly felt faint before collapsing.

“What I’ve been told is he suddenly was like, ‘I’m feeling dizzy,’” his wife Abby Cullimore, 27, told Today. “He laid down and all of a sudden he lost consciousness.”

Brenan’s friends quickly called 911 and waited for an ambulance to arrive. Although they didn’t receive instructions to start CPR, they eventually started compressions for 15 minutes until medics showed up and took him to a nearby hospital. Brenan was suffering cardiac arrest.

Cardiac arrest is the abrupt loss of heart function, resulting from a problem with the heart’s electrical system, according to the Mayo Clinic. This disrupts the heart’s pumping action and stops blood flow through the body.

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After arriving at the hospital, doctors continued compressions. Abby, who is a nurse practitioner, knew her husband was in bad shape.

“I know obviously what it means if you’re not getting somebody’s heart rate back and the potential of how much oxygenation wasn’t going into his body for a prolonged period,” she told the outlet. “They told me, ‘He’s very very sick. We’re still doing compressions.’ So at this point, it probably has been 45 minutes since the initial loss of consciousness.”

Doctors eventually placed Brenan on an Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO) machine, which supports patients with failing hearts and lungs by pumping oxygen throughout the body, and admitted him to the intensive care unit. “He did regain his heart rhythm,” Abby shared. “He was having a weak heartbeat on his own.”

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However, the following day, Brenan’s blood pressure destabilized and kept “tanking,” and inflammation in his brain was building. By Friday, two days after the cardiac arrest, an EEG showed “no signs of brain activity.”

“We took him off life support,” Abby said.

Prior to his death, Brenan had just recently learned from his parents that he had the gene for Brugada syndrome. 

Brugada syndrome, a rare but potentially life-threatening inherited heart condition that causes the heart’s lower chambers to beat in an abnormal rhythm, according to the Cleveland Clinic. The irregular heartbeat — ventricular fibrillation (v-fib) — prevents blood from pumping to the brain causing a person to faint or sudden cardiac death.

Abby explained that she and Brenan didn’t fully comprehend what having the rare condition meant for his health, and she wishes they received more education about it. 

“That’s frustrating because Brenan is a very smart person, and he would have listened to the advice doctors gave him if it was provided — and it wasn’t,” she said. 

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Abby told the outlet that she’s devastated by the sudden loss. After the couple married in October 2023, Brenan had enrolled in medical school and dreamed of becoming a surgeon. 

“He was just doing so well [in medical school] and patients loved him because of his personality,” she said.

“It is the worst pain I could have ever imagined,” she added. “If I can stop that from happening for somebody then I know me and my family and his family would like that.”

Now, Abby is using her grief as motivation to raise awareness of Brugada syndrome as well as the importance of CPR following cardiac arrest.

“Having access to defibrillators in places (where) people are playing sports should be a no-brainer,” she explained. “People should also consider being trained in CPR if they’re able. It obviously can save lives.”

“It gives us some sort of mission and purpose moving forward,” she said. “We’re wanting to keep his spirit alive and never stop talking about him because he’s so amazing.”