SLU AT Program Faculty and Students Have a Great Time in Tulsa at the MAATA Annual Meeting

Saint Louis University Athletic Training Program faculty and eleven students traveled to Tulsa, Oklahoma from March 28-30, 2019 for the Mid-America Athletic Trainers' Association's Annual Meeting.

Allison Stefan with Dr. Breitbach and Dr. Newsham

For SLU, the meeting had many highlights including:

• Dr. Kitty Newsham, faculty member and MAATA Secretary presented "Single-Subject Research Design Informing Clinical Decision Making".
• Allison Stefan, MAT Class of 2020, was awarded a MAATA Graduate Professional Scholarship
• SLU AT Students Cody Hutson, Matt Murphy and Jesse Schmitt participated in the MAATA Quiz Bowl.

Quiz Bowl Competition

SLU AT Students attending the MAATA Business Meeting.

SLU AT Students Appreciate Preceptor's Support for Clinical Learning at Kirkwood HS

SLU AT Clinical Site Spotlight - Kirkwood High School
By: Allison Stefan and Conner Mongoven (MAT Class of 2020)

As the winter sport season winds down for Kirkwood High School and spring sports are starting up, it has kept the athletic training room busy. We have acquired a ton of new experiences and hands on practice working with the high school athletes of Kirkwood. Our preceptor, Athletico Athletic Trainer Briana Lakebrink ATC, has been nothing but supportive and insightful with our clinical rotation thus far. 

Since we both came from a collegiate setting in the fall primarily covering football, the opportunity to be exposed to multiple sports has been very eye-opening. Boys and girls’ basketball has been the main sporting events we have covered this semester, but we also got to experience wrestling and swimming & diving. The after school rush keeps us busy wrapping ankles, setting up modalities such as e-stim and moist heat packs, and going through exercises/ stretches with athletes.

One amazing aspect of being at Kirkwood High School is having a preceptor so close in age. Briana has been super helpful giving us advice about the post-graduation life and what things she thinks we need to know when we graduate and pass our BOC Exam to succeed in the field. Just getting to have conversations with her and ask questions about her own path to becoming an ATC has taught us more about the real world AT life than we have gotten in the classroom. Part of her methods of having us learn is making us do the initial evaluations of injured athletes and then having her re-evaluate and give us feedback about our assessment. This has facilitated us growing into finding our own systematic approaches of evaluations and assessments. Briana also is very open to new ideas and wants us to bring things we learn in lab/ class into her AT room. 

We are both excited to see what’s in store for the rest of the semester at Kirkwood High School as spring sports pick up.

This is one of a series of posts by the Saint Louis University Athletic Training students featuring their clinical site and their preceptors. The number, quality and diversity of clinical instruction are major assets for the SLU AT Program.

SLU AT Students Experience Team Approach to Athletic Health Care at Washington University

SLU AT Clinical Site Spotlight - Washington University Athletics
By: Paul Lamb and Jesse Schmitt (SLU MAT Class of 2019); Maria Lingardo, Courtney Nall and Allison Stefan (SLU MAT Class of 2020)

The 2018 Fall semester has been quite busy for the two 2nd year (PY2) students (Jesse Schmitt and Paul Lamb), and three 1st year (PY1) students (Allison Stefan, Maria Lingardo, and Courtney Nall) at Washington University. While primarily caring for the football team, we have all contributed to treating all athletes at WashU. Our everyday schedule is a mixture of treating athletes using therapeutic modalities, such as laser, game-ready, and underwater treadmill program; as well as an ample amount of taping and preparation before going out to practice. In addition, we help athletes go through their rehab programs.

From day one to now, we have learned how to work together as a team with our preceptors Rick Larsen MS, ATC and Grant Rohrig MAT, ATC. The PY1 students feel comfortable asking questions to the PY2s and the PY2s are always willing to help out the PY1s. We have established mutual trust within our team, and our preceptors have given us more responsibility as weeks go by. One of our favorite parts of the week is when we sit down as a group and discuss injury reports as well as things to improve on from the week before. Team meetings help to ensure everyone is on the same page and that there is not any miscommunication.

At WashU we all get the opportunity to take turns traveling with the football team. Travel trips have provided all of us a great insight to what traveling with a team entails. We have all enjoyed our clinical experience this far at Washington University because we have the opportunities to do things like travel. We all are looking forward to the rest of the semester here and seeing how we keep developing our own skill sets, as well as, how we keep growing as a team.

This is one of a series of posts by the Saint Louis University Athletic Training students featuring their clinical site and their preceptors. The number, quality and diversity of clinical instruction are major assets for the SLU AT Program.

SLU Pre-professional AT Student Finds Inspiration from AT's at her Alma Mater - Stagg HS in Chicago

New AT Student Blog Post - Allison Stefan (SLU MAT Class of 2020) 

I am a junior student in the SLU AT Program from Chicago. As time is winding down in my pre-professional portion of the program and the professional phase fast approaches, I am looking forward to my future endeavors. In the past three years I have gained valuable knowledge from the great opportunities I have experienced in our program. From direct observation hours at Track Meets here at SLU to touring the Cardinals Athletic Training room, I feel I am prepared to take on the professional phase starting this summer. 

One memory that has motivated me to keep pushing through, is over spring break I returned to my high school to observe Certified Athletic Trainers, Kat Hermanas ATC, Reggie Castillo ATC, and Sharon West ATC at Amos Alonzo Stagg High School. It was such an amazing feeling coming back to the Athletic Training room I once was treated at as a student-athlete and where I realized what I wanted to do with my life. The rush of student-athletes crowding the Athletic Training room when the sound of the last bell rang brought back a flood of meaningful memories.

Over the course of the week, Reggie, Kat and Sharon enlightened me of new techniques that they implement in practice. From observing multiple ankle and knee tapings for the girls’ soccer team, to icing sore shoulders of the baseball players, and rehab/ strengthening program for an ACL tear recovery, I got to witness multiple tasks I will be doing in the future at my clinical sites.  Kat, Reggie, and Sharon demonstrated great practice by having the student-athlete repeat back the instructions they provided them, taking good SOAP notes for documentation, and having the injured student-athletes complete rehab notes pages logging the exercises they were doing. 

I had a wonderful time spending a full week in an Athletic Training setting which was a promising feeling that I chose the right path for a career. I got to play around with different types of tape/ equipment, observe strengthening and stretching techniques, and ask questions about how the AT got to where they were today, all things we have been practicing these past three years. My favorite was when the student-athletes would come up to me and ask me about their injury. Even though I couldn’t help the student-athletes at that point, knowing that I will be able to assist in the near future was encouraging. 

Overall, I could not have asked to observe better AT’s during my direct observation week at Stagg High School. I am both eager and nervous starting the professional phase in a few short weeks, but look forward to continuing down the path to reach my career goal as an Athletic Trainer. 

This is one of a series of blog posts written by students entering the professional phase of the SLU AT Program as a part of MAT 3000 - AT Student Development II.

SLU AT Students Conduct Workshop on Sports Medicine Skills for 2nd Year Medical Students

Athletic Training Sports Medicine Night with SLU 2nd Year Medical Students

By: Bridget Bushong (SLU MAT Class of 2018)

The Saint Louis University Athletic Training Society hosted a sports medicine night with second year medical students who have an interest in sports medicine. This workshop had three stations, run by Professional Year 2 (PY2) and 1 (PY1) students in the AT program, for the students to rotate through during the event. The stations included concussion testing, ankle taping and emergency spine boarding. While the PY2s were the group leaders, there were also several PY1s assisting during the sessions as well as undergraduate students who were models for taping and spine boarding.

This event is a great way to collaborate with other medical professionals and increase patient care by having an interprofessional team assisting with the care. While ATs are specifically trained to diagnosis, treat and manage concussions, apply assistive taping and handle emergency spine boarding situations it is important for other medical professionals to understand and be able to assist if necessary. The 2nd year medical students had great questions during each session that showed they were extremely interested in the sports medicine field. 

Overall this event was a huge success for spreading knowledge about the athletic training profession and building interprofessional teamwork. The group leaders for the concussion session were Killian Hollo, Adam Long and Paul Lamb. Group leaders for the taping session were Madeleine Bresnahan, Erin Fabbri and Rory Cusack. Taping Models were Claire Ditman and Cheyenne Meinershagen. The group leaders for the spine boarding were Bridget Bushong, Jenna Ginsberg and Ben Wildman, models included Mitchell Buerck and Allison Stefan.

A big thank you to all of those who participated in the event!

SLU Students Inducted into National AT Honor Society During Annual Speakers Series Event

6th Annual SLU Athletic Training Speakers Series and Recognition Ceremony

The Saint Louis University Athletic Training Program hosted its 6th Annual Speaker Series and Recognition Ceremony on Monday, February 20, 2017 at 7:00 pm in the Huh Auditorium at the Center for Global Citizenship. 

The event was presented by the Saint Louis University chapter of Iota Tau Alpha - the Athletic Training Honor Society - and supported by the SLU Student Government Association. The evening began with the 2017 initiation ceremony for the SLU Alpha Iota Chapter of Iota Tau Alpha, the National Athletic Training Honor Society.

Alpha Iota Chapter - Iota Tau Alpha

2017 Honorees

Undergraduate

Grant A. Hollander

Abigail E. Klosterman

Allison R. Stefan

Caitlyn E. Thomas 

Graduate

Sarah Haenchen

Scholarship award winners Amelia Meigs, Collin Peterson, Caitlin Gibson and Stephanie Ross were also recognized. Dr. Mardell Wilson, Dean of the Doisy College of Health Sciences, made introductory remarks and welcomed attendees.

The keynote speaker for the event was Erik Swartz, Ph.D., ATC, FNATA, Professor and Chair in the Department of Kinesiology at the University of New Hampshire. 

The title of his presentation was:

Changing the Paradigm: Can Taking Football Helmets Off Reduce Head Injuries?

Dr. Swartz’s described Helmetless Tackling Training - or HuTT® Technique - which involves removing the helmets during controlled tackling drills in football practices and has been shown to decrease the number of head impacts in games and practice.

Following the keynote presentation, there was a panel discussion which included Dr. Swartz; along with Washington University Athletic Trainer/former St. Louis Rams Athletic Trainer Jim Anderson ATC; and Super Bowl Champion/former St. Louis Rams Center Andy McCollum.

It was truly a memorable event!