Source: Ric Tapia / Getty
Kansas City Chiefs defensive end BJ Thompson is continuing recovery at home after suffering a seizure and going into cardiac arrest. This happened during a team meeting back on June 6.
Thompson’s agent said in email to NBC News on June 11 that the 25-year-old football player is home and “making progress.” This update coming days after Rick Burkholder, the Chiefs’ vice president of sports medicine and performance, told reporters Thompson was “awake and alert.”
Burkholder also provided additional details on the assistance Thompson was provided during his medical emergency. When he started seizing, teammate Harrison Butker ran to get help.
“As a team we tried to stabilize BJ and then put him on the floor while he was still seizing. Then he went into cardiac arrest,” Burkholder said. “Our team of that group of people provided CPR for him. He had one AED (automated external defibrillator) shock and came back. So he was only in cardiac arrest for probably less than a minute, minute and a half.”
Burkholder went on to say Thompson was on a ventilator overnight and heavily sedated. He was brought out of the sedation on June 7.
“He’s coming through quite well,” he said. “We don’t have a diagnosis. In medicine sometimes you don’t have that. Like I said, he’s awake and alert and he’s headed in the absolute right direction. All things good in a little bit of a hairy situation.”
Thompson will be in his second NFL season this year. He was selected in the fifth round of the 2023 NFL draft from Stephen F. Austin State University in Texas. The Arkansas native played in one game last season, recording two tackles in the Chief’s Week 18 victory over the Los Angeles Charges. The team went on to win the Super Bowl this year.
Right now, Chiefs players are taking part in a mandatory minicamp. It’s unclear when Thompson will be cleared to return to the gridiron.
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