The American Heart Association and the American College of Sports Medicine Guidelines recommend that all health and fitness facilities have an emergency plan in place. They also recommend that basic emergency equipment such as telephones be readily available in order to minimize cardiovascular damage if a member has a heart attack while working out.

The Guidelines were recently revised to "strongly encourage" the placement of automated external defibrillators at all facilities, to improve the survival rate following a heart attack.

The recommendations vary according to the type of facility, as follows:

	Level 1	Level 2	Level 3	Level 4	Level 5
Type of facility	Unsupervised exercise room (such as those in hotels, commercial buildings, apartment complexes)	Single exercise leader	Fitness center for general membership	Fitness center offering special programs for clinical populations	Medically supervised clinical exercise program (such as cardiac rehab)
Personnel	None	Exercise leader.Medical liaison recommended.	General manager; health/fitness instructor; exercise leader.Medical liaison recommended.	General manager; exercise specialist; health/fitness instructor; medical liaison.	Same as Level 4
Emergency equipment	PAD plan encouraged with AED as part of the plan in the host facility.	Blood pressure kit, stethoscope, PAD plan, AED encouraged.	Blood pressure kit, stethoscope encouraged; PAD plan, AED strongly encouraged in those facilities with more than 2500 members and those where EMS response time is expected to be more than 5 minutes.	Blood pressure kit; stethoscope.PAD plan with AED strongly encouraged.	Blood pressure kit, stethoscope, oxygen, crash cart and standard defibrillator.

PAD = public access to defibrillation; AED = automated external defibrillator

When evaluating a health/fitness club, be sure to ask about their emergency plans and procedures.

Related information: Lifestyle changes - Exercise - Safety | Fitness channel - Fitness basics

Source:  American Heart Association and the American College of Sports Medicine. Scientific Statement - Automated external defibrillators in health/fitness facilities. Circulation, March 5, 2002;1147-1150.