Importance Of Exercise And Sports Medicine

What is Sports Medicine?

Sports (and exercise) medicine is a relatively new medical speciality that deals with treatment and prevention of injuries related to sports and fitness. It is mainly concerned with prevention, rehabilitation, nutrition and performance training in order to help athletes improve their game.

It is mistakenly thought to be only for athletes but it includes the entire population – the active as well as non-active healthy and sick population by promoting amateur sportsmen and physical activity thus improving the quality of life in the general population.

Importnace Of Sports Medicine 

Physical inactivity is known to be one of the leading causes of morbidity worldwide. 

•    There are a number of evidences which support that regular physical activity plays a huge role in managing conditions like diabetes, obesity, cardio vascular and musculoskeletal diseases and also psychiatric conditions. Yet, there remains a huge gap between a medical practitioner’s knowledge of contribution of sedentary lifestyle in maintenance of chronic illnesses and effective prescription of physical activity for its management. Here, the role of sports and exercise medicine comes in play.

•    Activity and sports related injuries are very common especially in athletes. The role of sports medicine here is –

1.    To provide specialised care – Specialised treatment plans are required in order to maintain the performance of athletes in long run due to high chances of repetitive motion injuries.

2.    Re injury prevention – Sports medicine experts aim to provide advice and instructions on preventing injuries and avoiding re-injuring a previously damaged part. They also help athletes make important ‘return to play’ decisions.

3.    To enhance athletic performance – Forming tailored training programmes around an athlete’s individual strengths and weaknesses and identifying areas of improvement.

4.    Intense training can take a toll on the body and overall health of an athlete. Thus, a skilled sports medicine specialist becomes essential.

5.    Widespread support for the use of unproven supplements in sports or wearing certain types of anklets to improve athletic performance are a few pseudoscientific practices. A sports medicine expert guides an athlete on what type of clothing should be used in different conditions for heat regulation and what are the safe and beneficial equipments for various games and sports.

Conclusion 

Humans have been playing sports from the dawn of civilisation and hence the importance of sports medicine can not be over stated. More and more people today recognise the importance of exercise in good health. Sports that was once reserved for the fittest is now being embraced by people in everyday life. This makes sports medicine, with it’s comprehensive focus on all issues surrounding sports and exercise, ranging from injury prevention to performance training, more important and relevant than ever.