The State's first dedicated specialist sports medicine facility opened last week. Fiona Tyrrellreports.
The €70 million Sports Surgery Clinic in north Dublin - details of which were unveiled last Wednesday - is the first of its kind in Ireland and the UK and will provide elite athletes and those who want to enjoy an active lifestyle comprehensive specialist sports services, according to its founder, leading orthopaedic surgeon Dr Ray Moran.
In addition to the treatment of sports injuries, the clinic will also provide diagnosis, prehabilitation, treatment and rehabilitation of chronic degenerative joint disease.
The Santry clinic, which will be run on a seven-day-week basis, will have four operating theatres, 67 inpatient beds and 15 on-site consulting rooms.
GE radiology scanning equipment and Ireland's first 3Telsa MRI scanner (currently only 1.5Telsa is available in the State) will, according to the clinic, provide for superior diagnosis of soft tissue injuries. Giving much greater detail of joint surfaces and smaller joints it will also pave the way for better diagnosis of joint damage, Moran claims.
In addition, a 64-slice CT scanner, which is available in a few other facilities, will be used to screen for sudden death syndrome.
As a "sports crazy" country "up there with the Aussies" where a huge range of sports are played there is a big demand for specialist sports medicine services in Ireland, according to Moran.
People's requirements and expectations have advanced in recent years, but what we have been able to provide here in Ireland has not kept apace of this change, Moran explains.
The scope of sports medicine is very wide, he says. The clinic will provide services to everyone, "from the guy in the jersey" to the "weekend warrior".
The clinic aims to have a specialist in every sports injury area, all with sporting interests, according to Moran.
And specialist clinics will deal with areas such as groin pain, hamstrings and soft tissue.
Leading practitioners who will provide core services at the clinic include Dr Jimmy Colville, an orthopaedic surgeon who works a lot with rugby players, Dr Pat O'Neill, sports physician, Dr Conor O'Brien, consultant neurophysiologist, and Dr Kevin Mulhall, a hip and groin expert.
It's all about "a move from the general to the specialist", explains Moran.
This is a philosophy shared by Dr Pat O'Neill, dean of the newly established faculty of sports and exercise medicine.
Sports medicine has changed radically in Ireland in the past 10 years, according to O'Neill. With this evolution, however, come other issues.
"Specialisation is the key," he says. The day of the orthopaedic surgeon or cardiologist with an interest in sport is gone. The demand now is for career-trained sports medicine specialists, he says.
Athletes are increasingly looking for sport-specific doctors as well. The medical officer requirements of an elite swimmer are vastly different from the requirements of an international hockey player, he explains.
The new faculty of sports and exercise medicine is a joint faculty of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland. It will be accepting its first post-graduate students later this year.
This significant development in the State's sports medicine sector follows on from the decision by the Irish Medical Council to officially recognise sports medicine just over two years ago.
The new faculty means that for the first time Irish doctors will not have to travel abroad to specialise in sports medicine and exercise, explains O'Neill.
The establishment of the faculty in Ireland, which has over 500 fellows and members, spurred on UK sports physicians and the UK's first faculty of sports and exercise medicine was subsequently launched.
O'Neill, however, is keen to point out that sports and exercise medicine is not just for sports people.
It operates right across all levels of activity including sport, recreation and leisure. A big emphasis in the future will also be placed on the use of exercise in dealing with disease and medical conditions and extending into old age medicine, he explains.
The benefits of exercise in the treatment of cardiovascular disease, respiratory problems, obesity and diabetes need to be harnessed, he says. For example, people with diabetes can use exercise rather than drugs to burn off excess glucose and exercise can be used in the management of arthritis and inflammatory arthritis.
The seeds for willingness and ability to handle exercise must be sown at an early age, ideally at primary school level, he adds.
Another big chance for sports science in Ireland is the dramatic restructuring that the National Coaching and Training Centre (NCTC) is currently undergoing. Based in the University of Limerick, the NCTC provides support services to Ireland's carded athletes, coaches and national governing bodies.
Pending new legislation, the centre will be split into the Irish Institute of Sport and Coaching Ireland. Both organisations will become subsidiaries of the Irish Sports Council.
Based on international models, the Irish Institute of Sport will give a dedicated service to Ireland's elite athletes competing at major international sporting events such as Olympic and Paralympic Games, and European and World Championships. Former GAA chief Sean Kelly has been appointed as the council's initial executive chairman and he is in the process of recruiting for the council.
The NCTC will evolve into Coaching Ireland with a specific remit regarding coach development and education.
Against the backdrop of these national developments, significant advances in the availability of sports-dedicated medical care and sports tourism are taking place.
Earlier this year the Breaffy International Sports Hotel in Castlebar, Co Mayo opened for business.
The hotel lists 46 suites, 24 self-catering apartments, a 30,000sq ft multi-purpose indoor sports arena, a multi-functional astro-turf pitch and fitness centre among its facilities.
Late last year White's Hotel in Wexford unveiled its €1.5 million cryotherapy chamber. The facility can help athletes in recovery and fitness, according to its operators.
Used by the Irish rugby team during their training trips to Poland, cryotherapy chambers are credited with reducing muscles soreness and tissue swelling which occur after hard exercise. It is also reputed to speed up the recovery process after injury.
The use of ice baths, ice packs and ice contrast therapy have long been used to prevent swelling after muscle injury and are quite common even at club level in Ireland. The jury is still out on whether there are any additional benefits from sitting in a chamber of -110 degrees for three minutes.
There are questions to be asked about how effective cryotherapy chambers are, according to Dr McCaffrey, exercise medicine physician and lecturer in sports and exercise at Dublin City University.
Claims that cryotherapy can hasten recovery from training sessions as well as speed up injury healing have yet to be proven, he says.
Caroline McManus from the NCTC agrees that more research is needed to back up anecdotal evidence that it works. Extrapolated information from studies done on ice baths need to be followed up with studies done on the cryotherapy chambers themselves, according to McManus.
However, she says, it is possible that the chambers give more favourable conditions for injury recovery.