Competitive and elite sport often challenges the balance between health and performance, especially when it involves youth athletes. As Lausanne was getting ready to host the 2020 winter Youth Olympic Games, we had the opportunity to reflect on these challenges and on what they mean for sports medicine practitioners. Elite sport pushes athletes to the limit, be it through their own intrinsic drive to achieve ever more, or through the pressures of the multiple stakeholders around sport.
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How fortunate to have been able to take part in the medical organisation of the Lausanne 2020 Winter Youth Olympic Games (YOG) as head of the Olympic Village Medical Clinic and Medical Education Programme manager, while introducing some innovations to the Games!
From a clinical point of view, the temporary creation of a high quality interdisciplinary medical clinic provided all participants aged 14 to 18 years old with global and equitable care. We adopted the WHO criteria to offer an adolescent friendly setting.
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This interview was conducted by Dr Boris Gojanovic after the Lausanne 2020 Youth Olympic Games.
Richard, can you please introduce yourself, as a medical doctor and an athlete.
I am the medical and scientific director for the IOC and I started off in life as a rower. As an athlete, I had the privilege to compete in the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, and I won a gold medal there.
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Purpose: The Youth Olympic Games (YOG) are an elite sporting event for young athletes aged 15-18 years from all over the world. In the third Youth Olympic Winter Games, held in Lausanne in 2020, there were 16 disciplines and 81 events. In previous reports regarding YOG, injury risk was highest in the skiing events and alpine ski had a high rate, 14% in 2012 and 12.9% in 2016. The purpose of this report is to discuss the rescue organization, investigate the incidence of alpine ski injury during YOG 2020 and compare to previous reports.
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L’attribution des Jeux Olympiques de la Jeunesse (JOJ) à Lausanne a déclenché dans toute la Romandie un engouement extraordinaire pour la préparation des Jeux, avec la volonté affirmée de faire des Jeux pour les jeunes, avec les jeunes et par les jeunes. En tant qu’étudiant-e-s en médecine, nous avons eu le privilège de participer aux JOJ du 4 au 24 janvier 2020; un groupe de 20 étudiant-e-s en 6e année ont eu l'occasion d’effectuer un stage de médecine du sport, validé dans le catalogue de l’année à option, dans le cadre de la troisième édition hivernale des Jeux Olympiques de la Jeunesse à Lausanne, plus connus sous l’appellation Lausanne 2020.
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The Youth Olympic Games are an elite sporting event that include a series of educational activities and we built the whole concept of medical care at the village in the same spirit. We wanted not only to build a clinic with a lot of expertise, but to create a space for education for the young athletes, their medical teams and our volunteers.
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Since the first report from the 1968 Olympic Games, many studies have consistently reported poor oral health in elite athletes without any differences regarding socio-economic status or continental location. Poor oral health is an important issue as it has a clear impact on quality of life, confidence, appearance and socialisation. It also has an impact on sport performance and training with impaired preparation for competition. Many causes to impaired oral health can include nutritional diet and carbohydrate supplementation, oral dehydration, depression of various aspect of the immune function due to intense exercise, negative health behaviours, lack of awareness, time and prioritisation.
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The Youth Olympic Games were introduced in 2010 with the aim to bring young athletes not only an experience of competition on the world stage, but also to help them learn about the Olympic values, explore other cultures and develop the skills to become true ambassadors. The Lausanne 2020 Games provided an excellent opportunity to develop innovative concepts for health promotion and sports-related prevention. The enthusiasm across various sectors of society (political, academic and economy) empowered us to bring together multiple skills to materialize the IOC’s pledge.
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Die Änderungen des öffentlichen Lebens, Isolation, Quarantäne und damit verbundene weitere Einschränkungen der gewohnten Routine sowie Ängste und Sorgen sind nur einige Beispiele für die psychischen Belastungen durch die COVID-19-Pandemie (1). Nicht nur die Normalbevölkerung, sondern auch bzw. vor allem Leistungssportler sind diesen Belastungen ausgesetzt, und Leistungssport ist in Zeiten von COVID-19 nur noch stark eingeschränkt denkbar. Von einem Tag auf den anderen änderten sich für Sportler über Jahre und Jahrzehnte etablierte Tagesstrukturen und Gewohnheiten.
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It’s been a while since Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) was characterized as a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), causing major concerns and unfortunately panic in many countries. The on-going outbreak is of international concern and most countries have already announced a series of protective measures to confront this health threat of unknown magnitude. Travel warnings, scientific congress suspensions, cancellations of national holidays and closing of schools, amusement parks, cinemas, theatres and gyms are only some of these measures.
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Up to 40% of all athletes suffer from patellofemoral disorders every season, with a high prevalence of 15-25% especially in pivoting sports [1]. It has a high risk of recurrence, might persist for a prolonged time and therefore considerably influence the athlete’s trainability and performance over his career. Exercise-related, peripatellar pain is the most frequent observed condition and usually described as anterior knee pain (AKP), or synonymously called patellofemoral pain syndrome (PFPS).
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A common complaint in the musculoskeletal system is the anterior knee pain (AKP) or the so called patellofemoral pain syndrome (PFPS). The large number of contributing factors that lead to the symptoms make a proper diagnosis and targeted physiotherapeutic treatment management difficult. With regard to symptom-complex-oriented physiotherapeutic care, the question arises as to which therapy methods should be used for individuals with AKP. In order to be able to identify adequate physical therapy methods, an understanding of the clinical condition and the chosen treatment method is essential. This article aims to present a heuristic model of objectives and situational physiotherapeutic treatment methods.
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Patients with a patellofemoral pain are either in an acute state after a patellofemoral dislocation or are suffering from a chronic anterior knee pain (AKP), whereas AKP might be accompanied by patellar instability without dislocation. Whereas the acute state after a dislocation is mostly clear and its examination limited, the examination of a AKP is much more complex. A profound knowledge of the anatomy, the painful structures and patellofemoral biomechanics is essential in order to find the underlying pathology within the heterogeneous and diverse etiologies. Furthermore, a meticulous and precise examination is key to find the adequate treatment for AKP.
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Lateral patellar dislocation (PD) has multifactorial origin. Its treatment will depend on the physical demands of the patient, triggering event and injury mechanism of PD, number of dislocation episodes, patellofemoral joint morphology, and concomitant injuries.
After primary PD, despite the risk of recurrence being 33-77%, first treatment option is mostly conservative, except if an osteochondral fragment needs to be refixed or removed.
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Clinical imaging in patellofemoral disorders is fundamental for the understanding of the pathology, and to find the adequate treatment option. Anatomical risk factors such as trochlear dysplasia, patella alta, lateralized tibiale tubercle (measured by the tibiale tubercle trochlear groove distance), torsional or coronal lower limb alignment that are the origine of patellar maltracking or even patellar dislocation, can be assessed with high reliability on conventional radiographs combined with MR imaging.
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Patients with a patellofemoral pain are either in an acute state after a patellofemoral dislocation or are suffering from a chronic anterior knee pain (AKP), whereas AKP might be accompanied by patellar instability without dislocation. Whereas the acute state after a dislocation is mostly clear and its examination limited, the examination of a AKP is much more complex. A profound knowledge of the anatomy, the painful structures and patellofemoral biomechanics is essential in order to find the underlying pathology within the heterogeneous and diverse etiologies. Furthermore, a meticulous and precise examination is key to find the adequate treatment for AKP.
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