Read more about the article Risk for a Swiss medical doctor involved in a doping affair

Risk for a Swiss medical doctor involved in a doping affair

As soon as he prescibes medicine to an athlete, any physician is confrounted if he wants or not, and if he is aware of it or not, with the numerous and often complex rules treating with the universal fight against doping. In case of an involountary mistakee or not, the doctor can be involved in very unpleasant situations over different regulations. As ignorance is no valid defense form, it seems obvious that it is very imporant that each practitionner is informed the better possible about these legal aspects. This is the objective of the following presentation.

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Read more about the article Role of sports medicine in physical activity prescription for prevention and treatment

Role of sports medicine in physical activity prescription for prevention and treatment

There is incontrovertible evidence of the benefits of regular physical activity in the primary and secondary prevention of several chronic diseases, on contrary a sedentary lifestyle can progress into a Sedentary Death Syndrome (SeDS), which is a major Public Health burden due to its causing multiple chronic diseases and a large amount of premature deaths each year. In Italy, Sports Medicine represents a fundamental reference for those practicing physical activity at competitive or non-competitive level; its purposes include: health care of the athletes practicing all kind of sports, through the pre-participation screening for elegibility (such screening constitutes an established medical programme that has been implemented for more than 30 years), and the promotion of diagnostic and therapeutic protocols to guarantee the state of health of individual at high risk or carrying a specific diagnosed disease.

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Read more about the article EKG and sports

EKG and sports

There was a longstanding controversy on the role of resting ECG in the preparticipation examination in athletes, as well as in children and adolescent, in leisure time or top athletes. Besides other arguments, this was due to the limited validity, to the false positive and false negative findings often followed by a thorough clinical examination. However, recent studies from different research groups yielded a significant improvement in establishing ECG criteria in athletes discriminating normal from abnormal or pathological findings in athletes.This in addition is supported and improved by a software-based ECG device considering the new Seattle criteria. These new criteria from the Seattle conference reliably discriminate normal from abnormal findings. Frequent ECG findings in athletes, especially in those engaged in endurance sports showed sinus bradycardia, AV-block and signs of left ventricular hypertrophy.

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Read more about the article Physical activity and oncological hemopathies: role of the sports medicine doctor

Physical activity and oncological hemopathies: role of the sports medicine doctor

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As demonstrated for most of solid tumors, recent clinical studies clearly suggested that physical activity could play a key role in the management of patients with hematological malignancies, as a non-drug therapy. Physical activity interventions contribute to improve the quality of life of patients, mainly by reducing cancer-related fatigue (P<0.005), enhancing physical functioning (P<0.001), reducing the prevalence of depression including minor and major depressive episodes (P<0.05). However, if physical activity appears to be beneficial for patients with hematological malignancies, research is required to determine the benefits of different physical activities (i.e. type of exercise, intensity, frequency), and decipher the appropriate timing of intervention initiation.

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Read more about the article Genetic polymorphisms in alpha-actinin 3 and ­adrenoceptor beta genes in Austrian elite athletes and healthy controls

Genetic polymorphisms in alpha-actinin 3 and ­adrenoceptor beta genes in Austrian elite athletes and healthy controls

Background: During the last years many studies were conducted to investigate the contribution of various genetic variants to endurance and sprint/power performance of elite athletes. Data on team sport athletes are missing to a large extent. Therefore, the aim of the study was to investigate the frequency of selected polymorphisms on elite athlete status in Austrian team sport (handball, soccer), endurance and power athletes as well as in healthy control subjects.

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Read more about the article Sports Medicine in our four neighbour countries

Sports Medicine in our four neighbour countries

It is indeed quite a challenge to define sports medicine in a way that suits the greatest number. The reason is that the speciality involves a wide scope of different healthcare measures for a very broad population, from professional athletes to recreative active individuals. It contains diagnostic, curative, rehabilitative and preventive medical measures, on the field, in the clinic and the medical office or even in the physiology laboratory. And this heterogeneity also concerns the physicians practicing – or pretending it! – sports medicine.

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Read more about the article Influense of exercise duration in HIT strength training

Influense of exercise duration in HIT strength training

High intensity training (HIT) is a variant of single-set training. It is becoming increasingly popular in strength training practice. Contrary to the large number of research on multiple-set training, empirical investigations addressing HIT are rare. There is evidence that an important factor for muscle hypertrophy is the muscle time under tension (TUT). However, scientific knowledge about the optimal length of the TUT is lacking. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to compare the effects of a rather short TUT (20–40 s) with a rather long TUT (50–70 s) during HIT strength training. Nine experienced recreational sportsmen completed a ten week HIT strength training either with the short or the long TUT.

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Read more about the article Challenges with the biological passport: from sampling to interpretation

Challenges with the biological passport: from sampling to interpretation

In 2008, the World Anti-Doping Agency officially launched the biological passport. The first validated module to operate was the blood module to fight erythropoietin (EPO) and blood transfusion abuse. It has been quite efficient to catch some doped athletes, but above all, was very good in reducing the prevalence of doping. It is unclear if athletes stopped doping or have adapted and are taking micro doses of EPO or transfusing small blood volumes. More recently, the steroid module was released, but until now, the number of urine adverse passport cases is very low.

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Read more about the article Retesting the anti-doping samples: Best tool for deterrence?

Retesting the anti-doping samples: Best tool for deterrence?

Long term storage of the anti-doping samples and their ­reanalyses becomes today more and more a trend in the anti-doping community. The procedure has been implemented by the anti-doping authorities for the samples of the Tour de France and for the Olympic Games since Athens 2004 and has been always presented as a good tool to deter doping habits in top level sport. Recently, the World Anti-Doping Code introduced the possibility for anti-doping organizations to store the athletes’ samples up to ten years.

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Read more about the article Biological passport in athletes – role of the experts

Biological passport in athletes – role of the experts

The Athlete Biological Passport detects the effect of doping on the organism through longitudinal monitoring of biomarkers. The first quantitative analysis is performed by a software algorithm based on the Bayes theorem, taking into account previous values of the athlete. Profiles which have been found as abnormal with this technique are submitted for qualitative analysis to an expert panel regarding potential causes for the abnormality. Possible causes include analytical shortcomings, Pathologies, extremes of physiological regulation or doping.

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Read more about the article The CADF: a possible independent model for the ­management of a comprehensive Anti-Doping ­programme

The CADF: a possible independent model for the ­management of a comprehensive Anti-Doping ­programme

Created in 2008, the Cycling Anti-Doping Foundation (CADF), is a non-profit organization acting under Swiss law that became fully independent in 2013. Unique model for a sporting organization, the CADF’s role is to manage autonomously the Anti-Doping programme, on behalf of the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI). The relationships between UCI and CADF are regulated by a contract signed by the CADF Foundation Board and UCI management. The CADF activities are conducted in compliance with the World Anti-Doping code [1], the UCI Anti-Doping rules [2].

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Read more about the article Reflections on doping governance in sport

Reflections on doping governance in sport

Poor governance of sport, in particular all the policy implications that take the place of sport are causing many negative headlines in the press today. We have to do with doping, corruption, violence, rigging the competition, trafficking of players and all this corresponds to only the visible part of the iceberg. Sports ethics must be promoted to ensure good governance in sport suffers and this is undoubtedly these ethical issues are in the center of the concerns and challenges ahead for the IOC and for all national sports federations.

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Read more about the article Polarized training: a systematic review

Polarized training: a systematic review

Background: In high performance sports, a large variety of training and periodization concepts are used in daily training. However, at present it is unclear which combination of intensity, training duration and training frequency is superior thus producing the best adaptations. A promising, yet poorly scientifically investigated concept is the concept of a polarized training periodization. Methods: Prospective Studies, which examined polarized training compared to other training concepts, were identified from searches in Cochrane Library, EMBASE, Google Scholar, PubMed, SciVerse Science Direct and Web of Science.

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Read more about the article Bénéfices de l’Activité Physique Adaptée couplée à des Interventions Psychologiques ciblées pour les personnes souffrant de Sclérose en Plaques (SEP)

Bénéfices de l’Activité Physique Adaptée couplée à des Interventions Psychologiques ciblées pour les personnes souffrant de Sclérose en Plaques (SEP)

As part of a collaboration between the Centre Sport et Santé of The University of Lausanne and the sports psychologist Mattia Piffaretti, a physical activity program has been adapted for 29 patients suffering from multiple sclerosis. The 29 patients were divided into three research groups. The first group EX (n=5, age=50.6±9.8) followed a bi-weekly physical activity intervention program for a total of 12 weeks in addition to their usual medical treatment.

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Read more about the article Physical activity and chronic low back pain

Physical activity and chronic low back pain

Non-specific chronic low back pain is a multifactorial pathology with a significant impact on quality of life. Physical activity is a major axis of treatment to improve pain and functional capacity through structured exercises, but also to fight against physical deconditioning. It is therefore advised to perform leisure time physical activity regularly and in an adapted way. There is no contraindication to practice sports activities but they should be performed with special attention not to increase the symptoms. This article aims to evaluate the effects of different types of physical activity in chronic low back pain to help the practitioner to advise at best his patients and prescribe appropriate physical activity, source of pleasure and health benefits.

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Read more about the article From Cardiac Rehabilitation to Ambulatory Preventive Care: The Swiss Way

From Cardiac Rehabilitation to Ambulatory Preventive Care: The Swiss Way

Over the last years, cardiac rehabilitation services have expanded their indication to include not just patients after myocardial infarction or surgery, but also a variety of non-acute cardiovascular disease (CVD) states like stable coronary artery disease, peripheral artery disease, neurovascular disease as well as asymptomatic patients with no history of CVD but with a constellation of cardiovascular risk factors, especially metabolic syndrome and diabetes mellitus. In 2015, 110 ambulatory cardiovascular prevention and rehabilitation programs existed in Switzerland: 57 for cardiac, 17 for peripheral artery disease and 36 for diabetes rehabilitation.

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