SPORTS
4
Jocks'
Docs
Two orthopedic
surgeons discuss
the treatment of
sports injuries.
MIKE ROSENBAUM
Bob Mc Keown
Sports Writer
Dr. Sidney Goldman examines an X-ray.
T
he treatment of sports in- .
juries, commonly called
sports medicine, is a rapid-
ly growing business. All
though orthopaedic
surgeons handle most sports-related
injuries, there is no legal definition of
what a sports medicine doctor. is. In
the new "Sports Medicine" section of
the Yellow Pages, for the North Wood-
ward area, the one column of listings
include orthopaedic surgeons plus
others who specialize in podiatry,
kinesiology, chiropractic treatment
and acupuncture. Others, such as den-
tists and plastic surgeons, also treat
some sports injuries.
So the person with a sports-
related injury must be careful to
select a doctor who has the ability to
treat his or her specific injury, rather
than simply looking for a sports
medicine caregiver.
Still, the physicians who general-
ly see the most sports-related injuries
are the orthopaedic surgeons. Dr.
Sidney Goldman, chief of orthopaedic
surgery at Providence Hospital in
Southfield who also has a private Bir-
mingham office, says most of the doc-
tors in his profession see patients who
are 'you and me' type people who
play weekend sports or occasional
sports. Not terribly competitive."
Dr. Robert Teitge, an orthopaedic
surgeon based in Warren as well as at
Detroit's Hutzel Hospital, divides the
injured people he sees into three
categories. The first includes people
48
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 1989
who are "a little bit older" than when
they competed regularly — "That's
completely relative, that's any age —
and are more out of condition than
they may have been -when they were
younger. And they try to do what they
did 10 years ago. They try to approach
it at the same rate of return. And the
body doesn't have the strength and
flexibility to tolerate the load that
they suddenly want to apply to it."
Teitge's second group includes
people who have not exercised before,
or are trying a new activity,
something that they "aren't designed
or constructed optimally for doing .. .
Consequently, some part fails." The
third category involves accidents that
"may not be due to an intrinsic
weakness in the system, that may be
really due to too high of a load on the
part."
Goldman says, "We see more in-
juries that are repetitive in nature
that are part and parcel of the activi-
ty — injuries that we've seen before,
that are very similar to the last guy
who did the very same thing — and
not that many freak injuries."
Goldman lists the common in-
juries he sees, moving from toe to
head. They include toes injured by
tennis shoes, sore feet and stress frac-
tures from running or aerobics, rup-
tured Achilles' tendons, sprained
ankles, various knee injuries, a few
thigh and very few "true" hip injuries,
many back injuries which "seem to be
proportional to the age of the patient."
Also, there are dislocated shoulders
from falls, elbow problems from rac-
quet sports or from kids throwing a
ball too hard, fractures of wrists or
fingers, a lessening number of neck
injuries, and head injuries.
Goldman is particularly critical of
football as a source of major injuries.
"It's a little sad that high school
athletes who will never go on to a pro-
fessional career in football and who
like other sports and are good at other
sports . . . often get ruined by football
and lose their opportunity to follow
another sport as they get older and
out of competition. We don't see any
kinds of numbers of injuries from
other contact sports, even lacrosse,
hockey, basketball — which is semi-
contact — as we do from football."
Although Teitge has worked with
Detroit's major professional sports
teams, he did so because of his in-
terest in treating sports injuries, not
because he is a sports fan. Goldman
is active in recreational sports. "I
really do enjoy sports and I enjoy
treating people who like sports," he
says. "My goal is to get them back to
some level of sport involvement, pro-
viding it's safe to do so .. .
"I would rather say that we are
sports injuries doctors instead of
sports medicine doctors. But the
catchword these days is 'sports
medicine' and that's what people are
looking for — someone who wants
to practice sports medicine."
"The orthopaedic surgeon," adds
Goldman, "if he has a specific interest
in sports medicine, might then start
seeing another segment of the popula-
tion that's more competitive, primari-
ly people in schools, either high school
or college, who are playing on organiz-
ed teams.
"Very few of us see the profes-
sional athlete, who seem to have their
own sub-system of referral."
The doctors agree that the keys in
avoiding most sports injuries include
slowly building yourself into good
physical condition and warming up
properly before doing any exercise or
participating in a competitive sport.
"For the person who has been
.either out of exercise for awhile or a
person who actually has been exercis-
ing for awhile and is trying to in-
crease their intensity," says Teitge,
"the increases have to be slower than
they might have been. I think you
have to look at a very long timetable
for getting into shape.
"Even professional athletes can't
get in shape in two or three months.
It's a year-round proposition.
"You have to recognize and accept
the fact that it's going to take a very
long time to develop your condition-
ing. You have to not give up."
Goldman also believes in condi-
tioning but warns that " I don't think,
from my experience, that excellent
conditioning in any way guarantees
that the person will not be injured by
doing the sport that he conditioned
for . . .