'My best friend's heart just stopped working and there was no reason behind it'

Heart condition Sads claims around 500 lives a year in UK

- REBECCA WHITTAKER

When Luca Quinn didn’t answer his phone over the new year, his best friend wasn’t concerned.

But after 40 missed calls from his worried girlfriend, Luca’s family and friends felt they were left with no other option but to break down his flat door - only to find the 30-year-old in bed, unresponsive.

Despite the best efforts to resuscitate him, it was too late. He had died without any warning from a sudden and unexplained heart condition called sudden arrhythmic death syndrome (Sads).

Jed Pomeroy, 33, a lifelong best friend of Quinn, told The Independent: “His heart just stopped working, and there was no kind of reason behind it.

“At first I found it incredibly hard that the cause of Luca’s death was unexplained. I’ve had to learn to accept that some people are just really unlucky. Luca was the funniest person you could ever hope to meet - with a heart of gold.”

The condition, which affects around 500 people every year in the UK, causes a person to die suddenly and unexpectedly from cardiac arrest without any clear cause. Quinn’s girlfriend Beatrice Vacnuic was abroad at the time visiting her family, leaving Quinn at their flat in Chiswick, west London.

The couple had been speaking regularly, but on the evening of 29 December, Quinn didn’t answer his phone. She tried again later that evening and then again the following day with no answer.