Shareef O’Neal wants to help young athletes in testing for heart issues

Shaquille O’Neal’s son Shareef shared his plan on Twitter Friday to help young athletes in testing for heart issues.

Shareef, a freshman at UCLA, redshirted his first year with the program after testing revealed he had a heart issue that required surgery. He underwent heart surgery last year. Now that his life has been changed by the surgery, he said a year later that he wants to help young athletes in this regard.

When I get older I’m going to do a lot with heart research and find ways to create a system for HS and college athletes to get their hearts checked before participating in sports, I’ve gotten a lot of messages from young athletes who are dealing with heart issues and it’s sad

— Shareef O’Neal (@SSJreef) December 27, 2019

That’s thoughtful of O’Neal to want to help others so they get these serious health scares identified earlier in their lives. For O’Neal, it wasn’t until he stepped on campus at UCLA that his heart condition was discovered.

Now a redshirt freshman forward, O’Neal has played in nine games for the Bruins and is averaging 2.8 points and 3.4 rebounds per game.