If you’re an athlete, you might be familiar with the role an athletic trainer plays in getting you ready to play and making sure you receive the proper treatment should you get injured. But, with the power of an electronic health record, St. Elizabeth Healthcare is taking athletic training to the next level—injury prevention.
Ben Felz with NKU Men’s Basketball and Jeff Carpenter with NKU Women’s Basketball, describe how St. Elizabeth is working with schools, coaches and teams to prevent injury. “Our athletic trainers are assigned to specific schools, so they spend a lot of time with the coaches and athletes each year. We began noticing trends in injuries by location or by sport, and decided we should do something more to help the athletes and coaches.”
The Orthopaedic Institute at St. Elizabeth, a partnership between St. Elizabeth Healthcare, St. Elizabeth Physicians and OrthoCincy Orthopaedics & Sports Medicine, created the Injury Prevention Program for schools as a part of their numerous athletic partnerships.
Injury Prevention Program
As St. Elizabeth Healthcare transitioned to a new electronic health record system, the sports medicine team saw that as an opportunity to collect injury data on their athletes and schools.
“As we collect the data, we analyze it regularly to determine trends in injuries within a school and even within a sport at each school,” says Brad. “From there we meet with the coach and the principal to discuss what we are seeing and develop a plan to improve the overall health of our student-athletes.”
The Injury Prevention Program includes:
- Analysis of injury trends.
- Evaluation of team practice to identify areas of improvement.
- Development of strength and conditioning program to reduce injury.
Brad says, “This program is so important because we are making our population healthier and relieving the healthcare burden. It is also a great service to our community. The kids have short-term goals of competing today and long-term goals of college sports, professional sports or just living a healthy life free from injury.”
The numerous St. Elizabeth Healthcare athletic partnerships are in partnership with St. Elizabeth Healthcare, St. Elizabeth Physicians and OrthoCincy Orthopaedics & Sports Medicine to provide sports medicine services to high schools, middle schools, universities and other athletic organizations in Northern Kentucky. Each athletic partner receives a team of specialists, including athletic trainers, who work with our physicians and rehabilitation specialists
March is recognized as National Athletic Trainer Month to spread awareness about the work of athletic trainers. Brad, who has been an athletic trainer at St. Elizabeth for eight years, describes why he loves the work he does, “The best thing is being able to interact with the student-athletes and serve as a role model who they can rely on and trust. I get to help them reach their goals and I feel like I have a small hand in their success.”
Learn more online about the St. Elizabeth Healthcare’s athletic partnerships or call (859) 301-5600.
