Marshall University Athletics
BOGACZYK: Marshall's Sports Medicine Institute a Great Prescription
7/1/2015 12:00:00 AM | General
By JACK BOGACZYK
HERDZONE.COM COLUMNIST
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. -- It's too hot to be mid-December. So, why are Tom Belmaggio and the rest of Marshall Sports Medicine community acting like Christmas is just around the corner?
It's those telecast commercials and print ads you may have seen in recent weeks ... the ones with athletes working out in front of a darkened background ... the ones that say "Coming This Summer" or "The Region's Game Changer."
Well, the Marshall University Sports Medicine Institute is scheduled to open Monday, July 13. It's the final piece of the 101,000-square-foot facility funded by the Vision Campaign for Athletics to open.
To the medicine men and women -- and more -- it's the piece de resistance.
"It's like putting the best icing you can on a great-tasting cake," Marshall Athletic director Mike Hamrick said. "It's amazing to have something like this, a great medical facility in which we can all take pride that it's at Marshall and in Huntington ... just amazing."
The MU Sports Medicine Institute is located at 2211 Third Ave. It's the front section of the Chris Cline Athletic Complex, which also includes the indoor facility, Jeff Small Track, Buck Harless Student-Athlete Academic Center, the MU Athletics Hall of Fame and Hoops Family Field at the Veterans Memorial Soccer Complex.
Belmaggio, who for seven years as Marshall's head athletic trainer, is now the director of sports medicine for athletics and in the past year he's added the title of "sports medicine program coordinator" -- overseeing the synergy that is a major part of the MU Sports Medicine Institute.
"It's a collaborative effort of four groups," Belmaggio said. "Working together are Marshall Athletics, Cabell Huntington Hospital's SMART Center (Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation Therapies), and Marshall Orthopedics. And Cabell Huntington Hospital is opening a franchise of Stack Velocity Sports Performance (www.velocitysp.com/marshall).
"It's a comprehensive sports medicine center that includes all of those constructs."
So, how many universities have a sports medicine octopus with so many tentacles.
"I don't think there's anybody out there that's doing what we're doing," Belmaggio said. "I don't know of anybody. To be able to include athletics with a hospital, Marshall Health, Marshall School of Medicine -- all of those elements -- I don't think anybody out there is doing it this way.
"Really, this is very unique."
It's the kind of thing that can make a difference in Marshall recruiting. And it's not just for the Herd. The MUSMI will be open to the general public during regular business hours, Belmaggio said.
The 19,995-square-foot Sports Medicine Institute will be home to 15-20 employees. It will house five doctors' offices, nine exam rooms, a waiting area, check-in desk, a conference room, a physical therapy area with an open floor plan, weight equipment for therapy, cardio equipment, and a hydrotherapy area including a polar-plunge pool, a thermal plunge pool and a HydroWorx underwater treadmill.
There's an X-ray room with plans to add an MRI in the future, Belmaggio said. There will be athletic training offices for four, with taping tables and stations related to therapy.
"We'll have seven doctors with hours there regularly," Belmaggio said.
That list includes Drs. Chuck Giangarra and John Jasko (orthopedic sports medicine); Dr. Greg Hendricks (primary care sports medicine); Drs. Ross Patton and Dr. David Rupp (family practice), Dr. Mitzi Payne (pediatric neurologist) and Dr. Norman Cottrill (pediatrician).
"Dr. Payne and Dr. Cottrill will have a concussion clinic in there," Belmaggio said. "We'll have regular business hours open to the public to see orthopedic doctors and physical therapists. The Velocity Sports Performance Center will be geared toward athletes ranging in age from 8-17, and also include `weekend warriors.' We hope to have some type of adult fitness program once we get things up and running.
"We're making this as comprehensive as we can. We want this to be a one-stop shop sports medicine institute. That being said, we're going to have massage therapists in there. We'll have a chiropractor, a sports psychologist and a nutritionist.
"We want to take sports medicine as a whole, and provide it in one building, so any services an athlete needs, whether it be a Marshall University athlete or a weekend athlete from the general public, we'll be able to take care of their needs in the Sports Medicine Institute.
"There's not going to be a place like this anywhere else in the entire state." . Marshall's athletic training staff will have an area in the facility, too, although pregame and pre-practice taping still will be done in the Shewey Building and Henderson Center.
"The athletic training staff will have everything they need right there," Belmaggio said. "They'll be able to treat athletes just as they have in Shewey and the Henderson Center. It will just be another extension to those training rooms, whether it's softball, football, soccer, track, everyone can get in there."
So, if a Herd athlete or visiting player is injured in a game at Edwards Stadium or across the street at Dot Hicks Field, the athlete can be transported to the MUSMI for examination and treatment and X-ray if needed.
"Absolutely," Belmaggio said. "That's the real benefit of having all of these medical services in one place for athletes who get sick, for athletes that need to see an orthopedic physician or need to see a family practice physician.
"How awesome is it (for a trainer) to open up the door and say, `Hey, Doc, do you mind coming over here to take a look at this (injury). That doesn't happen every day in our kind of setting.
"If you're a Marshall athlete, you can walk right across street or down the street and get that medical care, whereas before, we were constantly driving them back-and-forth to Cabell Huntington Hospital."
Belmaggio offered a couple of examples of the kind of treatment available in the MUSMI.
"We have an anti-gravity treadmill (AlterG) that has the capability of taking 80 percent of your body weight off, so we'll be able to be a lot more aggressive with our rehab and conditioning when an athlete does have an injury," he said. "We can put him or her on that treadmill to take gravity -- or in the hydrotherapy treadmill to take buoyancy off the athletes' joints -- and therefore be able to condition them a lot quicker and hopefully get them back onto the field a lot faster."
The Sports Medicine Institute was a particular desire of Dr. Stephen Kopp, the Marshall University president who died suddenly last December. Kopp wanted the sports medicine facility in the Herd's new complex to do significant research.
When coal magnate Chris Cline made an original $5 million contribution to the Vision Campaign through the Cline Family Foundation, that money was earmarked to establish an endowment to support new faculty and scientists in what was to become the Sports Medicine Institute.
That $5 million was doubled by a match through the West Virginia Research Trust Fund's "Bucks for Brains" program.
Belmaggio said sports medicine research is just one aspect of what will take place in the MUSMI.
"We have a number of research projects ongoing or ones we will be doing," he said. "We're doing concussion research. Our first project with concussions is we're going to compare two main baseline concussion tests ... neuropsychological testing. One is popular, ImPACT -- most Division I schools, NFL teams, Major League Baseball use that.
"The second is a program called C3 Logix (an integrated concussion management system), and it's iPad-based and it actually does a lot more than ImPACT because it measures balance, measures vision in addition to what ImPACT does (measures cognitive skill).
"So, we're going to take those two and compare them. That's our first research project. We have other research projects going on -- ACL (injury) prevention, Vitamin D research. Research is a huge component of the whole facility.
"Everything we have here, combined, with the research, I think it's going to put us on a national level in the field of sports medicine."
Another program that's being founded within the Institute -- and one overseen by Belmaggio -- is the hiring of athletic trainers for five area high schools -- Huntington, Spring Valley, St. Joseph, Wayne and Lincoln County. That outreach program is being run through the Velocity Sports Performance Center wing of the MUSMI.
Belmaggio said the Velocity program is being initiated by the "Skills and Drills Basketball Camp." The four-day camp starts Monday, July 13, at 9 a.m. at the Gullickson Hall gym. The camp is open to boys and girls ages 8-17, and the camp fee of $150 is discounted to $100 with registration by this coming Monday (July 6). (For more camp details, go to www.velocitysp.com/marshall).
Asked to name what he finds most special in the MU Sports Medicine Institute -- where construction continues at a furious pace to make Opening Day -- Belmaggio said it's not one thing.
It's nearly 20,000 square feet.
"I think the most unique thing is the gathering all of these components of sports medicine and bringing it all under one roof," Belmaggio said. "Whether it's a Marshall athlete or any patient, he or she will be able to come in and see Dr. Giangarra or another doctor and get orthopedic care.
"They'll be able to go into our rehab facility and get the proper care and guidance to treat that injury. And then the third construct of this whole thing is if they need more conditioning, if they need to get quicker, stronger, faster after that rehab, we can deal with that as well.
"It's just going to be a great thing for us."