Sports Medicine

Whether you’re a pro athlete or a weekend warrior, the expert orthopaedic specialists at MU Health Care offer the most advanced treatment options to get you back in the game.

What is a Sports Medicine Doctor?

Sports medicine doctors are experts who have received additional training to better diagnose and treat injuries of the musculoskeletal system, including muscles, joints, tendons and ligaments. Most injuries caused by playing sports or that come from an active lifestyle don’t require surgery. Sports medicine doctors are well-equipped to help you recover from sprains, ACL tears and other ligament and muscle injuries, broken bones, overuse injuries, concussions and more.

Sports medicine doctors also provide education about nutrition and injury prevention.

They are an important resource for helping patients who have sustained injuries know when it’s safe to return to their sport or activity.

Our Team Approach to Sports Injuries

Our team of specialists includes sports medicine doctors, athletic trainers, dietitians and physical therapists. They work together to evaluate and treat your sports injury with the goal of getting you back to the sport you love as quickly as possible. With on-site services, such as X-ray and MRI, physical therapy and pharmacy, we offer comprehensive athlete care in one location.

Personalized Care to Get You Back in the Game

Our treatment plans never take a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, our team takes the time to work with you to determine which treatments are best for your lifestyle, goals and recovery. Your personalized treatment plan for sports and exercise-related injuries may include surgical or nonsurgical solutions, such as minimally invasive procedures, soft-tissue massage or physical training and reconditioning. If it's determined you need surgery, our goal is to not only heal your injury, but do so with the least amount of time away from work, family and the things you enjoy. Our pediatric and adolescent sports medicine specialists also provide tailored treatment plans for younger athletes.

Injury Prevention

The keys to preventing injuries never change, no matter your age or ability level. They include:

• Proper nutrition and hydration to make sure your body is ready to move
• Rest, particularly for youth and adolescents, who need 8-10 hours of sleep
• A ramp-up period when increasing your activity levels, like at the start of a sports season
• Warm up before your activity and stretch after you’re done

Using throwing and running form evaluations, our sports medicine and physical therapy experts can help you evaluate which muscle groups are too weak or too dominant during your activity and recommend stretches or exercises to further help you prevent injury.

Sports-injury Conditions

Our specialists treat a wide variety of sports-related injuries for both adult and youth athletes, including:

• Concussion, including a Sports Concussion Clinic featuring a sports neurology specialist
• Fractures or broken bones and bone stress injuries
• Shoulder rotator cuff tears
• Shoulder instability including dislocations and separations
• Elbow injuries including elbow instability and ligament tears
• Biceps and triceps tears
• Lateral epicondylitis, or tennis elbow
• Hip injuries including labral tears
• Cartilage injuries
• Meniscus injuries
• Knee torn tendons and ligaments (ACL, LCL, MCL, PCL)
• Leg exertional compartment syndrome
• Ankle sprains and tendon tears
• Muscle strains
• Acute or overuse tendon injuries (i.e. tendinitis or tendinopathy)
• Bursitis, which happens when the bursae — small, fluid-filled sacs that cushion the bones, tendons and muscles in joints — becomes inflamed
• Athlete nutrition and sports and fitness eating disorders

Treating Your Sports Injury

Unique Subpopulations We Treat

Many of our doctors and specialists are active in sports themselves, so we know how passionate athletes can be about their sport. Many of our providers also have received advanced training to take care of athletes. Our expertise and passion drive our specialized sport-specific treatment of athletic subpopulations, including female athletes, collegiate athletes, and youth sports athletes.

Nonsurgical Treatment Options

Many sports injuries fortunately do not require surgery. Common nonsurgical treatments include rest, pain relieving medications, icing the injured area, and physical therapy. Our therapists offer specialized treatment for concussions and post-injury muscle recovery, such as blood flow restriction therapy, which is a rehabilitation technology to help a person regain strength with less strain across the joint. We offer athletic training to prevent injuries, and active release therapy, a movement-based massage technique. Transitional training to aid athletes back onto the playing field is also available through our Human Performance Program.

Sports Concussion Clinic

Athletes who suffer a head injury need quick, expert care not just for their health, but also to ensure they can return to their sport as quickly and safely as possible. Our Sports Concussion Clinic offers timely diagnosis and extensive treatment plans for athletes of any age.

Complete concussion care requires a variety of disciplines. Our Sports Concussion Clinic includes physicians specializing in neurology and orthopaedic sports medicine as well as athletic trainers who have experience in concussion diagnosis and treatment.

We treat all individuals at risk for concussion, including but not limited to:

• Athletes across all sports and ability levels
• Active individuals including adult league players and weekend warriors
• Coaches
• Referees

Our concussion treatment and management services include, but are not limited to:

• Medical evaluation with a sports neurologist and athletic trainer
• Imaging and testing as indicated
• Musculoskeletal evaluation
• Neuropsychological evaluation
• Pain and medication management
• Concussion education/health literacy
• Care coordination and follow-up referrals
• Comprehensive therapy services

Surgical Treatment Options

If your injuries require surgery, our team will help you through the process. Our surgeons use the latest techniques and minimally invasive procedures to get you back to your sport quickly. With outpatient surgery available for some procedures, you could be back home and recovering the same day. Some of our surgical treatments include:

• Cartilage treatment: Our team is able to offer minimally invasive surgeries to repair cartilage damage. We also provide our patients opportunities to participate in ongoing clinical trials where innovative treatments for cartilage injuries and diseases are being used. These clinical trials involve collecting cartilage and regenerate the cells to help store damaged cartilage, and enhance your recovery.
• Meniscus treatment: We offer minimally invasive surgery, known as arthroscopic surgery, which allows our surgeons to view inside the joint and fix repairable meniscus tears, preventing future damage and discomfort. When individuals are suffering from a lack of meniscus, we can also perform meniscus transplants.
• Osteotomy: For patients who have degenerative joint disease due to overuse and arthritis, our surgeons can perform advanced procedures like an osteotomy that realigns your joint by adding a new bone wedge into the affected joint to relieve pressure from the damaged area.
• Injections: We offer injections that help support healing for injuries and conditions like arthritic knees and ankles, including anti-inflammatory steroid injections. These targeted injections can also help with nerve pain, tendinitis, bursitis and other joint-related issues.
• Tissue transplants: Our doctors are able to treat certain joint injuries conditions, such as the knee, hip, shoulder and ankle joints, with tissue transplants in order to improve a person’s quality of life. With our advanced tissue preservation system, known as the Missouri Osteochondral Allograft Preservation System (MOPS), we can extend the life of transplant tissues, such as cartilage, longer, which improves the health of the transplanted tissue and success of the surgery.

Returning to Your Sport

Our sports medicine doctors and physical therapists offer unique comprehensive evaluation tests to assess your readiness to return to a sport after an injury or surgery and can personalize treatment to each athlete’s injury. Not only do we provide the best care possible, we have the science to know when an athlete is ready to get back into action. Some of this testing may include:

• Comprehensive Return to Sport Test. We use a battery of functional tests to monitor your recovery and evaluate your readiness to return to your sport after your shoulder and knee injuries or surgeries.
• Selective functional movement analysis (SFMA). A series of full-body movement tests for musculoskeletal evaluation that gives our team insight into what's causing your pain and what treatment plan, including exercises and physician therapy, is best for your condition and recovery.
• Kinect – Portable Motion Analysis System. A markerless tracking system used to analysis your walk and movement. This information helps our team provide a personalized therapy plan to help you recover and back to your sport.
• Dartfish Video Motion Analysis System. This allows our therapists to break down running mechanics and determine the need for running retraining to prevent or treat running-related injuries. Learn more about our specialized running therapy.