American Medical Society for Sports Medicine
For Immediate Release Apr 14, 2008

OVERLAND PARK, KANSAS:  The American Medical Society for Sports Medicine awarded Dr. Dave Simon an Outstanding Research award for excellence in sports medicine research. Dr. Simon presented his research titled:"Potential Triaging of Referrals for Lumbar Spinal Surgery Consultation - A Comparison of Referrals from Pain
Specialists, findings on Advanced Imaging or Three-item Questionaire."

The research study entailed a questionnaire that used three questions to better define a patient's back pain in hopes to decrease unnecessary referrals and reduce the time needed to see a specialist. The scenario of clearly back-dominant pain had a sensitivity of 100% in identifying surgical candidates. For the scenario of leg-dominant pain, the questionnaire had a sensitivity of 83% and specificity of 73%. This was found to be significantly more specific than CT/MRI. The questionnaire was as sensitive and trended towards being more specific than pain specialist assessment.

A larger multicenter study is being planned to further validate these results.

Dr. Simon is a physican at the University of Ottawa in Ottawa, Ontario.

The American Medical Society for Sports Medicine (AMSSM) was organized in 1991 by physicians who recognized the need for an organization within the field of sports medicine that approached athletes, exercising individuals and teams comprehensively with consultative and continuous care of their orthopedic, medical, nutritional and psychosocial issues. Although sports medicine concepts are often thought of in conjunction with professional and elite athletes, these concepts apply to athletes of all levels including grade school, high school, college and recreational athletes. AMSSM is comprised of over 1000 Sports Medicine Physicians whose goal is to provide a link between the rapidly expanding core of knowledge related to sports medicine and its application to patients in a clinical setting.

NOTE: For more information, please contact the AMSSM, 11639 Earnshaw, Overland Park, KS 66210, (913) 327-1415.