SAN ANTONIO – At just 16 years old, UTSA golfer Lauren Rios faced a life-altering diagnosis of an atrial septal defect, a heart condition that forced her to confront not only her health but also her aspirations in athletics and medicine.
“I didn’t think anything was wrong, because I have never been symptomatic or had problems as a kid being an athlete, so it just didn’t feel real,” said Rios.
Rios had found out she was born with the atrial septal defect, which is a hole in the upper atrium of her heart.
“So when I found out I was working at our high school physicals with my sports medicine team, and I was the only student athlete in our group,” said Rios, in part. “So I got to go through like our little line. And then the physician, who did my physical, said there was a murmur, and that’s all I got at the time. So I told my mom, and they did not clear me for the fall season of high school golf, so I had to go see a cardiologist. And then when I went there, we found out about the defect, and I kind of just didn’t feel very real.”
Going into that winter break, she had open-heart surgery to fix a hole in her heart.
“I only missed one week of school, which was like our little midterm finals week, and then I didn’t come back to golf until, I think, February I was cleared to start, like even putting, which was a little tough because that summer it was my time to start getting recruited,” said Rios, in part. “So I kind of felt like I was a little behind the eight ball. I‘m not practicing. I’m not playing. Like, is a school going to want to recruit me? So then I knew when I came back, I was going to have to work really hard to get back to where I was and then continue improving to get school to notice me.”
The diagnosis might have stopped someone from competing athletically altogether, so Rios learned something profound about herself.
“I can handle a lot,” said Rios. “I can go through something very difficult like that, and I’ve been able to find the positives it’s given me. It definitely put a lot of things in perspective. I think I know, like even just being like 16, like I have my whole life ahead, but something like that just really put like perspective and like value on everything I’ve done and like the people I have around me, which made me like extremely grateful for everything like I have and I’ve done.”
Rios has always been interested in the medical field as a profession. With her experience with open-heart surgery, she became inspired to become a surgeon.
“I think I kind of knew surgery because it’s the most hands on you can do, but I saw kind of the behind the scenes of it, which was a very interesting kind of like afterwards when I was in the ICU and on the cardiac floor, like just everything like that has to be done honestly,” said Rios, in part. “Like there’s so much more that goes into it than I imagined.”
Rios also touched upon what a younger athlete who might have an atrial septal defect can learn from her story.
“I hope they learn not to get so caught up in the moment with what’s going on, but think, ‘how would it benefit them in the future?” said Rios.
As for her future, she’s studying for her Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) and applying to medical school.
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