Is Your Athlete Getting Enough?

Is Your Athlete Getting Enough?

by | Feb 12, 2020 | Sports Medicine

What is enough?
Your body needs fuel to grow, learn, and perform. Food provides this fuel. You need to change how much you eat depending on what you are doing. You also must be careful to eat enough of the right foods to fuel your body for growing and to perform in your sport.

What happens if you don’t get enough?

  • Time out of sports due to illness and injuries like stress fractures
  • Prolonged recovery from injuries
  • Not growing to full height
  • Not able to build adequate muscle strength
  • Other medical problems that can last a long time

How do you know if you are not getting enough?
Here are some signs that suggest you may need more fuel:

  • Feeling tired a lot
  • Feeling moody
  • Getting injured easily
  • Getting sick often
  • Not improving strength and skills despite effort
  • Decreased performance
  • Losing weight

How do you get enough?
Whether you are hungry or not, eating three meals a day with two to three snacks is a must for active, growing athletes. To be sure you are eating the right foods, mix food groups at each snack, and meal and be sure to eat all food groups each day.

An example of what this may look like:

MEDITERRANEAN LUNCH WRAP RECIPE

Are YOU getting enough?
When you feel healthy and participate in classroom, activities and sports without becoming excessively tired or injured, you’re off to a great start with eating enough and eating well. Keep up the good work!

Our sports medicine team includes a dietitian with a special interest in young athletes. A former figure skater, Taylor Morrison, M.S., R.D., CSSD, L.D., visits with several types of patients in our clinic. Here are some situations where a sports dietitian can help an injured athlete get back to action:

  • History of repeat injuries
  • Restricted diet due to preferences—choice to be vegetarian or due to food allergies
  • Difficulty fueling to meet the demands of training and recovery

Learn more about pediatric sports medicine.

NBC DFW: Scottish Rite Amputee Patients Gain Independence on Ski Slopes

NBC DFW: Scottish Rite Amputee Patients Gain Independence on Ski Slopes

by | Feb 10, 2020 | Events, Press Coverage

Since 1981 Scottish Rite for Children has hosted the annual Amputee Ski Trip. Fourteen teenage patients, as well as medical staff and hospital chaperones, spend a week at the National Sports Center for the Disabled (NSCD) in Winter Park, Colo. Lives are transformed while leaving a lifelong impact on all who attend.  

Patients from around the country have the opportunity to gain independence, while being surrounded by others with similar conditions. “It can be really hard to connect with people and you start to think that you can’t ever find anyone that will understand you,” says a previous attendee. “But here, everyone understands you.”

NBC DFW covered the sendoff ceremony at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. Watch the full story here. 

Additional Ski Trip Sendoff segments: 
CBS 11 Evening News
FOX 4 Good Day.

Limb Reconstruction Meeting Brings Experts from Around the World to Dallas

Limb Reconstruction Meeting Brings Experts from Around the World to Dallas

by | Feb 7, 2020 | Research & Innovation

Scottish Rite Hospital is honored to host the second annual Controversies in Pediatric Limb Reconstruction (CPLR). This two-day seminar brings together leaders in the field to collaborate and discuss the latest treatment techniques for pediatric patients with limb deformities, limb loss, musculoskeletal infection and severe length discrepancies. 

In conjunction with the Limb Lengthening and Reconstruction Society (LLRS) and the Pediatric Orthopaedic Society of North America (POSNA), the program includes lectures, panel discussions and case studies presented by hospital staff and international guests. Co-directed by pediatric orthopedic surgeon David A. Podeszwa, M.D., and researcher Mikhail Samchukov, M.D., CPLR serves as a unique opportunity to bring together experts from various backgrounds who provide care to this specific patient population.

As a leader in this specialty, the Center for Excellence in Limb Lengthening team travels the world to teach others about the devices used to treat conditions associated with limb deformities. CPLR cultivates local and international collaboration right here in Dallas, TX. 

“We are excited to host this prestigious event,” says Podeszwa. “We have the opportunity to collaborate with some of the best from around the world, right here in our hospital, to advance the care provided to these patients. CPLR gives attendees a focused and comprehensive program where they are able to learn, debate and discuss the latest treatment techniques – with the hopes that they take that knowledge and apply it at their respective institutions worldwide.”

Learn more about our Center for Excellence in Limb Lengthening.  

Sports Medicine Team Makes an Impact at Annual Meeting

Sports Medicine Team Makes an Impact at Annual Meeting

by | Jan 30, 2020 | Sports Medicine

Last week, staff from our sports medicine team were in Glendale, AZ for the 7th annual Pediatric Research in Sports Medicine Society (PRiSM) meeting. PRiSM is a unique group of multidisciplinary medical professionals who are devoted to advancing the care for young athletes. The three-day collaborative conference is designed to cultivate relationships among the members and feature advancements in numerous areas of pediatric sports medicine.

With more than ten staff members in attendance, including advanced practice providers, orthopedic surgeons, physicians, physical therapists, biomechanists and research coordinators, Scottish Rite for Children was well-represented throughout the meeting. Selected to present various research projects and serve as moderators, staff had the opportunity to showcase their work and engage in meaningful discussions with other experts in the field. A few of the topics presented included:

Assistant Chief of Staff Philip L. Wilson, M.D., is proud of the team’s involvement. “We have a strong showing at PRiSM each year,” says Wilson. “However, this year, we were represented in almost every session by staff from different departments, which shows our dedication to excellence in every aspect of care for young athletes. PRiSM gives us a great platform to share our knowledge while also giving staff the opportunity to learn from other specialists.”

The team contributed to more than half of the multicenter interest groups who work throughout the year but come together during the annual meeting to brainstorm and discuss the latest findings and progress of projects.

  • Our movement science lab team has made profound progress in establishing protocols to document baseline measurements to aide in projects of interest to the injury prevention group.
  • Sports medicine physician Jane S. Chung, M.D., is a member of the female athlete interest group and the sport specialization group who are both employing surveys to address specific questions.
  • Pediatric orthopedic surgeon Henry B. Ellis, M.D., is the steering committee chair of SCORE – Sports Cohort Outcomes Registry. This effort has already shown very high potential to have major implications in the safety and quality of arthroscopic procedures in youth across the country.
  • Shane M. Miller, M.D., sports medicine physician and concussion expert, is actively involved in a new concussion project that will expand our current understanding and efforts by teaming up with six other pediatric sports medicine programs.

Learn more about the Center for Excellence in Sports Medicine.

Get to Know our Staff: Sophia Ulman, Movement Science Lab

Get to Know our Staff: Sophia Ulman, Movement Science Lab

by | Jan 27, 2020 | Sports Medicine

What is your role at the hospital? What do you do on a daily basis? 
I am the assistant director of the Movement Science Lab (MSL) at the Frisco campus. In our lab, we use motion capture technology to analyze movement patterns of patients and/or athletes. Similar technology is used to create video games and special effects in movies. I love working in the MSL because every day looks different. Some days we get concussion patients who come into the lab the day they are diagnosed to participate in research, or we might see a patellofemoral instability patient who has recently been cleared to return to sport. Other days, I spend my time processing data or writing a research paper. Recently, I have loved mentoring our high school and college interns while they were on winter break. We stay on our toes down in the lab.  
What do you enjoy most about Scottish Rite for Children?
I absolutely love sharing what we do in the lab. We get quite a few tours that come through including students, medical staff and/or community partners. I enjoy describing what motion capture is, how we use it to help our patients and what we are working on in regard to injury prevention for youth athletes.  

What was your first job? What path did you take to get here? How long have you worked here?
My first job was working at a local basketball gym – cleaning the floors, running the concession stand and working the clock/book for games. I worked numerous jobs throughout high school and undergrad, and my favorite job while at Duke University was working for the Sports Information Office, writing stat sheets and transcribing press conference interviews.

My path to Scottish Rite started the summer after my sophomore year when I shadowed one of Dr. Ellis’ surgeries. He was a fantastic resource for me. After sharing my interests in biomedical engineering and biomechanics, he referred me to Dr. Tulchin-Francis. The following summer I had the opportunity to intern in the Movement Science Lab in Dallas, which led to a student position in the K-Lab at Duke Medical Center (Coach K’s Human Performance Lab). In this lab, I helped with biomechanical assessments of professional athletes and sport-specific patient populations. I had the opportunity to work with an extremely experienced and successful medical staff.

These two internships prepared me for my graduate program at Virginia Tech where I completed my Ph.D. in collaboration with the Army Research Lab. My dissertation investigated performance prediction and injury prevention in the military domain using biomechanics. This work was directly related to current sports research and led me back to Scottish Rite for Children. I have been working here since June, and I am super excited for what we have already accomplished and what we have in the works for future research.
 
What’s the coolest or most interesting thing you’re working on right now?
In the Movement Science Lab, we recently started the SAFE Program (Specialized Athletes Functional Evaluation). We are excited to analyze elite athletes’ movements pre-injury to see if there are any movement discrepancies or deficiencies in specialized athletes compared to a multi-sport or non-elite athlete. Additionally, all participants will be participating in injury surveillance for a year after testing, which will be extremely interesting to observe.
 
What are you currently watching on Netflix?
Killer Inside: The Mind of Aaron Hernandez.

Who would you most like to swap places with for a day?
I would love to switch places with one of Coach K’s (Duke University basketball coach, Mike Krzyzewski) assistant coaches for a day. In my opinion, he is one of the best coaches in basketball history (or all sports) and an obvious leader in his field. I would love the opportunity to learn from him and pick his brain for a day.

What is a fun or interesting fact about your hometown?
My hometown is Argyle, TX, like the sweater/sock pattern.

What is your favorite thing to do when you’re not working? 
Spending time with family and friends, attending sporting events in the community and running.