Sports Medicine to a physician usually means treating or “curing” an athlete’s injury through the use of drugs or surgery. I have an entirely different perspective of Sports Medicine. My goal for Sports Medicine is non-invasive and rehabilitative. My goal is to bring out and develop the natural athlete in every man, woman and child. My goal is to develop all 10 IFPA Components of Fitness so that everyone can experience the joy of the optimum development of their own bodies. My goal is to bring relief to all of humanity by allowing them to feel the speed, strength, power, endurance, agility, balance, coordination, flexibility and ideal body composition we were created to enjoy. My goal is to eliminate the vast majority of disease, disability, and dysfunction that results entirely from lack of physical activity, poor nutrition and lifestyle choices. My goal is to return the practice of medicine to its original roots where physicians understood that health and freedom from disease has its foundation in exercise and healthy eating. My goal is to build a bridge between the medical and health care industries to the fitness industry where we can join forces to stem the tide of the ravages we are seeing in our societies. The destruction caused by the lifestyle that has created Heart Disease, Cancer and Diabetes Epidemics …No! World Wide Pandemics that threaten not only our adult population, but our children as well. My goal is to return the doctor to the status of “Healer!”
The International Fitness Professionals Association (IFPA) has been working in close association with the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine (A4M). The foundation of A4ms’s Anti-Aging protocols is exercise, nutrition, stress management and diet. The IFPA has developed a Fellowship for doctors: The Fellowship in Preventative Medicine, Nutrition and Sports Medicine (FPMNSM) for the primary purpose of providing doctors the precise knowledge, skills and abilities they need to guide their patients with safe and effective treatments, protocols, exercise and nutrition prescriptions necessary for the 65 different disease, disabilities and dysfunctions resulting from the patient’s poor lifestyle choices.
The need for these skills is urgent and the need for the doctor to develop a new “Scope of Practice” utilizing these skills is critical.
The global population is living longer…AGING. Current estimates project that by the year 2020 there will be 54 million people in the USA over the age of 65. This is over 1 in 6 of every man, woman and child in the USA! We are seeing this same trend happening in every industrialized nation on the planet. As technology and food availability proliferate our citizens’ health deteriorates! Technology makes physical activity unnecessary and cheap, easily obtained, highly processed and questionable nutrient profiles rob us of the body’s building blocks for good health. By 2020 most countries will see a 50% increase in citizens over 65 years of age and a corresponding increase in the previously mentioned epidemics!
Simultaneously, Sports Medicine Doctors are now seeing more and more “Senior Citizen Athletes”! People who “refuse to grow old” in the traditional sense, and remain competitive athletes into their 80’s and OLDER! While treating these “Master” athletes presents new challenges for both the Sports Medicine Physician and Trainer, this situation also presents us with the true Fountain-of-Youth! Research on these Master Athletes shows us that a well trained 80 year old can have greater strength, speed, power, anaerobic and aerobic endurance, agility, balance, coordination, flexibility and body composition and literally perform at a higher level in all IFPA 10 Components of Fitness and display better health and medical markers: LDL, HDL, BP, RHR, etc. than untrained 20-30 year olds.
This is tremendously positive news for all practitioners of medicine, Anti-Aging Medicine, Health, Fitness or anyone who just doesn’t want to “Grow Old- GRACEFULLY!”
The good new is the old image of aging is wrong! With the proper protocols, virtually everyone can lead a longer, fuller, happier and more fulfilling life! We can also reverse much of what is called “Aging” by the FPMNSM protocols. The physicians who have adopted the FPMNSM protocols for themselves have already attested to the fact that in as little as 8 weeks they have personally experienced 20 years or more of regeneration in all Components of Fitness and their health and medical markers! No drug or medical procedure available now or in the foreseeable future can come close to that result!
Sports Medicine doctors may be concerned about the PROBLEMS: i.e. Arthritis (seen in 47% of older patients) and other medical conditions associated with aging! But the FPMNSM focuses on SOLUTIONS! And the FPMNSM solution is specific exercise and nutrition prescriptions extracted from the extensive IFPA curriculum of over 70 difference advance fitness, health, nutrition, sports conditioning/medicine/psychology/ etc. courses for fitness, health, sports and medical professionals.
The FPMNSM system is designed for the doctor to test, diagnose and prescribe the requisite FPMNSM protocol, treatment and prescription; and for the IFPA Certified Trainer to execute and manage the patient’s program under the doctor’s ongoing supervision.
In the vast complexities of modern society there are rarely on solution to any problem, but this is the exception. While many have attempted to find ways around it and others have attempted to avoid it at all costs (including sacrificing their health and very lives) the fact remains: To be healthy and live an optimum life will require exercise, nutrition, stress management and diet! Once you deal with your emotional issues surrounding exercise, the only logical decision to make is to learn how to do it right and then just do it!
As the New Year begins, I request you join me in this goal. I am issuing a special plea to doctors and all members of the medical and health professions to join with all fitness professionals in this worthy cause. Together we can build a healthier, happier society. Doctors should be teachers first and not just managers of disease. Doctors should be healers and teachers who lead their patients to optimum health. Please consider this among your New Year’s Resolutions!
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
