Report of activity of the American Medical Association Committee on Injury in Sports.

Abstract

Physicians in the United States have been active as sportsmen and as medical advisers to athletes since the beginning of organized athletics. Until recently there was no organized approach, however, on the part of medical associations or societies to the problems of sports medicine. This is in distinct contrast to the situation in Europe, where well-defined programs have been in existence for so many years that this branch of medicine has become a specialty in itself. The original suggestion for the establishment of a Committee on Injury in Sports was made at a meeting of the Board of Trustees of the American Medical Association in December, 1953. Exploratory contacts were made and letters sent to interested physicians, which resulted in the appointment of such a committee under the chairmanship of Dr. Augustus Thorndike of Boston in 1954. The first meeting of the Committee took place in Chicago in June, 1956.