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With interviews Grove City High School Athletic Trainer Trish Devincentis (TD) and Kittanning High School Athletic Trainer Todd Harvey (TH), both located in Pennsylvania .

According to the National Athletic Trainers’ Association website (www.nata.org), Certified Athletic Trainers are allied health care professionals educated and trained in the prevention, assessment, treatment and rehabilitation of injuries.

The Mayo Clinic (http://www.mayo.edu/mshs/at-career.html) states that athletic trainers develop athletic injury prevention and treatment programs using their knowledge on anatomy, biomechanics and pathology to assist physically active individuals. Athletic trainers also work as a line of communication between the injured athletes and their coaches, doctors and possibly even their families, to determine the correct approach for treatment and also return to play.

The services provided by Certified Athletic Trainers are divided into six performance domains: prevention of athletic injuries, clinical evaluation and diagnosis, immediate care, treatment, rehabilitation, and reconditioning, organization and administration, and professional responsibility. These domains were initiated to help explain the skills and knowledge obtained by Certified Athletic Trainers.

Prevention of athletic injuries can be determined by setting the proper conditions for activity by using the proper equipment for the activity, and making sure the athlete is participating within the proper physical conditions for the activity. Athletic trainers should have the proper knowledge to clinically evaluate and diagnose physically active individuals’ injuries. The athletic trainer is usually the first person to see the athlete after an injury is sustained. If the athletic trainer knows how to evaluate the injury, proper first aid can be applied and referral to the appropriate medical personnel can be done. Immediate care can be done on the field and off of the field. After the initial assessment, first aid can be applied to the athlete’s injury along with management of the injury until referral to the appropriate personnel is made.

In the case of the person’s injury, treatment, rehabilitation and/or reconditioning may be needed for the athlete to return to play. Athletic trainers work in conjunction with physicians to treat, rehabilitate, and recondition an injury with the use of proper therapeutic exercises, equipment, and therapeutic modalities. Organization and administration of the athletic training room facility is also done by the athletic trainer. This entails maintenance of health and injury records of each individual, equipment and supplies inventory, supervision of the facility, and the policies and procedures for running the athletic training program and facility. Lastly, athletic trainers should assume professional responsibilities as well as personal qualities. Personal qualities that allow athletic trainers to identify themselves as professionals when interacting with diverse personalities are stamina and the ability to adapt, empathy, a sense of humor, communication, intellectual curiosity and ethics. With these personal characteristics athletic trainers are educators, counselors, researchers, and promoters of the profession of athletic training.

Athletic training students directly observe and work with Certified Athletic Trainers in various clinical settings, including high schools, clinics and collegiate athletic training facilities throughout their education process. At these clinical rotations, students gain experience with approved clinical coordinators and may attend all practices and games of an assigned sports team, perform evaluations of injuries, develop rehabilitation programs, and implement injury prevention strategies. Students are required to take classes in twelve content areas (www.caate.net):

Other classes often taken by students involve exercise physiology, human anatomy and physiology, biomechanics and medical ethics.

Once a person has obtained a bachelor’s degree or master’s degree from an entry level accredited program he/she can sit for the Board of Certification (BOC) examination. The BOC is an independent body which is accredited by the National Commission for Certifying Agencies and nationally certifies athletic trainers. Once one has passed the BOC examination they become Athletic Trainer, Certified (ATC). In order for one to keep these credentials, seventy-five hours of medically related continuing education credits must be completed every three years.

For an athletic trainer to practice in the

United States

, most states require they are certified and/or hold licensure or registration according to the state’s practice act. Currently, only four states do not have any athletic training regulations. The certification, registration and licensure allows for athletic trainers to practice under state statutes, which recognizes them as health care professionals.

The profession of athletic training has grown in leaps and bounds over the last 50 years! Because of the significant increase in the profession, employment opportunities have also increased. Certified Athletic Trainers are seen in numerous healthcare settings today. The majority of certified athletic trainers are seen with high school, college and professional sports teams. However, there has been an influx of those employed at different settings, including sports medicine clinics and hospitals. The diversity of the profession has even grown to the point where certified athletic trainers are employed in the corporate world, the military, NASA, NASCAR, industrial settings, in physical therapy clinics, as physician extenders and even with medical supplying and equipment sales. Because athletic training specializes in the physically active, the need for certified athletic trainers is always present and the settings and opportunities are endless.

Trish Devincentis: “In high school, I sprained my ankle and had to work with the athletic trainer, so I was introduced to the profession. I became interested in the field and began observing and working with my athletic trainer on a regular basis.”

Todd Harvey: “I've always loved sports, and I had an interest in how the human body worked. My freshman year of college I started out as a Biology major, but when I found out that there was a job (Athletic Training) where you could be around sports all the time, help others get better, and learn more about how the human body worked I decided Sports Medicine was the major for me.”

TD: “My favorite part of the job is being able to help athletes more than they thought I could help them. I like working in the high school setting because students still view sports as a privilege, not a right. This makes them a lot easier to work with than those athletes that feel like they are getting paid to play.”

TH: “I enjoy the interaction with the students and seeing them get better with rehab, etc. so they can play. I also enjoy the games, especially when one of our teams is having a winning season. Finally, I enjoy having June and July off.”

What are key characteristics for an athletic trainer to possess?

TD: “Flexibility is definitely a key characteristic because of the constantly changing practice and game times. Good people skills and organization are also very important. Also, it is important to be self-driven and motivated in order to deal with the demanding schedules placed on you.”

TH: “The ability to communicate is important because you need to be able to
communicate with a wide variety of people (athletes, parents, coaches, administrators) in an effective way. It also helps if you love sports, and if you are a hard worker because you will put in long days during certain times of the year.”

TH: “The trust that is developed between the athletic trainer and the coaches
and athletes. After being at KHS for as long as I have been I feel good
about the level of trust I have with the coaches and athletes here.
That is so important - I hear of other schools where the coaches try to
sneak an athlete back into a game against the athletic trainer's wishes, but
thankfully that doesn't happen here.”

TH: “There is no such thing as normal hours in athletic training. It changes day to day based on what events are going on. I start around 2:00pm on
a school day can finish as late as midnight (away football game) or as early as 6:00pm on a spring afternoon when baseball or softball has an
afternoon game. During the winter season there are a lot of nights I'm not done until 9:00 or 9:30pm due to basketball or wrestling home events.”

What is a typical day like for an athletic trainer?

TD: “I come in to school two hours before practice to do paper work and to meet with the athletic director. During eighth period, I provide treatments and do rehabilitation with athletes that need it. Then I tape the athletes for practice, monitor any practices, attend any games, and mentor my athletic training students.”

TH: “I arrive and clean my athletic training room tables. Then I make sure I have tape supplies ready to go and before long the athletes are lined up to get taped and treated. After taping and rehab is done I may go to a soccer game. While at the soccer game I tend to whatever injuries occur. After the soccer game I return to the school for the evening volleyball match. If there are any injuries during the match I tend to them. Once the match is over (approximately 9:00pm) I head home.”

What are some areas of athletic training that need improvement?

TD: “In the high school setting, I feel that there needs to be better communication between coaches and the athletic trainer. All of the coaches that I work with have my cell phone number, but they still won’t call and report all injuries. Instead, they will send the athlete directly to the emergency room and not even tell me.”

TH: “The pay in some parts of the country and at some levels is still low. I feel there are still a lot of people that don't know who an Athletic Trainer is or what they do, and so we probably need to increase our efforts to educate the public.”

TD: “There is definitely the full spectrum. Most parents know the basics of what I can do. Some think that I am only there for games or certain sports. Others think I just get water and ice. Then there are even the parents that do not know there is a certified athletic trainer at their child’s sporting events. For parents, it depends on their personal experiences with me or if their child has worked with me. For athletes, they better understand my job once I work with them.”

TH: “I think most appreciate what we do and do not want to return to the days when there were no Athletic Trainers to take care of their children or athletes.”

After talking to different student athletes, the consensus was that most athletes know the basic skills that an athletic trainer possesses; however they do not realize the full extent of the job. After an injury, when an athlete has a closer interaction with the athletic trainer, it is then that the athlete realizes all that the job of a certified athletic trainer entails. They explain that athletic trainers obviously have a large knowledge base. This is evidenced by the rehabilitation programs, accurate evaluations and prevention strategies. Athletes also recognized the functional testing that they were put through and the various balancing and agility drills that were used to determine if they were ready to return to play. Athletes stress that, unless injured, their teammates know that there is an athletic trainer covering their practice and is there to tape and take care of injuries; but they would not be able to fully describe all of the responsibilities that go along with the career. Also, athletes feel that their coaches know most of the work that an athletic trainer does, but still not the full scope of the job. Regarding their parents, the students explained that they knew there was someone there covering practices and games, but they probably had no idea as to what exactly an athletic trainer does.

Most coaches recognize the basic skills that an athletic trainer possesses. This was especially found to be true with the wrestling coaches. These coaches respect and value the opinion of their certified athletic trainer in regards to various skin conditions that are prevalent in the world of wrestling. They are quick to acknowledge the vast knowledge base of athletic trainers and the importance of having one at their practices and matches.

Many people are not aware of all of the skills and knowledge that a Certified Athletic Trainer possesses. A job in athletic training requires competency in a wide variety of areas, from dealing with injuries to working with people. As the profession grows and expands, more and more people are working with athletic trainers and gaining insight as to what the job entails. As people become exposed to and more familiar with athletic training, the answer to this question will be clear:

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