Wizards medical staff issues

[pineappleheadindc]

I don't know if there is a thread on this in the long ago archives.

But for now, all I have to say is "quack"..

Discuss.

[montestewart]

I saw an article today about Johns Hopkins medical system acquiring Sibley. I don't know whether that means the Wizards can start getting Hopkins-quality treatment in DC or whether Sibley will be passed off as "improved" merely by a change in affiliation.

[Scabs304]

The whole Arenas in a boot thing is mind boggling to me. I still feel sorry for Muresan. How many careers are they going to allow go down the tubes? Hope we clean house there.

[pineappleheadindc]

I swear, if the guys in Baltimore diagnose Gil's tendon problem as something really serious - something that the crack Wizards "medical" staff should have caught, Uncle Ted's gonna get a long and screeching diatribe from me about the staff.

Isn't Rip Hamilton required to use a mask permanently beccause of a screw up by the medical staff while he was here?

[Benjammin]

Really someone needs to go through all the crazy injuries over the years that did not heal properly. Either the Bullets/Wizards are terribly unlucky, or they have crap for a medical staff.

Here are some names that come to mind.

Jeff Ruland--assorted injuries
Bernard King--knee issues
John "Hot Plate" Williams-knee--although he probably did not work hard enough.
Robert Pack---some sort of foot issue?
Mark Price--a blind guy Gordan Gund sold the Bullets a broken down Price
Rex Chapman--that guy was always hurt.
Muresan--supposedly he ruined his feet making the movie "My Giant"
Chris Webber---remember the shoulder separations--finally they fixed it appropriately
Lorenzo Williams--that guy never sniffed the court, nice signing guys
Tim Legler--knee
Brent Price--knee
Rip Hamilton--the nose, now he has to wear a mask whenever he plays
Jerry Stackhouse--never the same after his injury with the Wizards
Etan Thomas
Darius Songaila--back
Javaris Crittenton
Gil Arenas--nothing needs to be said

Now some of these guys were just injury-prone and/or had devastating injuries that perhaps the best medical attention wouldn't have helped. But that's a pretty daunting list. Feel free to add to it.

[montestewart]

The disintegration of the Bullets-Bernard King relationship, as I recall, was over his keeping his own counsel during his physical rehab the year after an all-star season. I'd always heard he was a quirky, maybe even testy character, and to be sure, he never recovered fully. But maybe there's more to that story than I know, and maybe he had reason not to trust the Bullets medical staff.

[Benjammin]

The disintegration of the Bullets-Bernard King relationship, as I recall, was over his keeping his own counsel during his physical rehab the year after an all-star season. I'd always heard he was a quirky, maybe even testy character, and to be sure, he never recovered fully. But maybe there's more to that story than I know, and maybe he had reason not to trust the Bullets medical staff.

Yeah, I didn't add Bernard because he came to the Bullets after a serious injury and I too heard he did his own thing.

[montestewart]

The disintegration of the Bullets-Bernard King relationship, as I recall, was over his keeping his own counsel during his physical rehab the year after an all-star season. I'd always heard he was a quirky, maybe even testy character, and to be sure, he never recovered fully. But maybe there's more to that story than I know, and maybe he had reason not to trust the Bullets medical staff.

Yeah, I didn't add Bernard because he came to the Bullets after a serious injury and I too heard he did his own thing.

Just as a sidebar to the main story, maybe he fits in. Even if original injuries or failed diagnoses took place elsewhere, a new teams failure to evaluate and treat old or ongoing injuries is on them. Witness Martell Webster in Minnesota.

Ideally, a medical staff will not only succeed at a high rate in diagnosing and treating injuries, but will inspire confidence in players to work with and trust them. I don't know that it impacted his recovery one way or the other, but it sure looked like Arenas had some trust issues with the medical staff.

You could probably add Crittendon to that list.

[Ruzious]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

[Donkey McDonkerton]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

I think we all have been fans long enough to criticize, we've learned a lot, learned that they are BAD!

[MJG]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

Good point. While we're at it, let's not criticize the coach or GM or David Stern or the refs either.

[AceDegenerate]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

What can we criticize here then? Only Gilbert Arenas?

[montestewart]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

doclinkin

[Benjammin]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

In the immortal words of that brilliant philosopher Richard Pryor, "Who you gonna believe? Me, or your lying eyes?"

I choose to believe my "lying eyes".

[Wizards2Lottery]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

What can we criticize here then? Only Gilbert Arenas?

No we're just supposed to accept that since this team is young and inexperienced, that the coach, the GM and the ownership are completely off the hook for anything stupid they do.

Not that we're supposed to trust the players who have publicly called out the Wizards medical staff. They are all haters too.

[AceDegenerate]

So again, anybody have any idea why Gilbert was never checked by the Wiz training staff for the injury he "faked"? Because if this ankle injury was incurred during training camp, and he told Flip his leg was bothering him, had he been examined by a competent doctor or training staff they would have most likely picked up on this ankle injury that now has him getting cortisone shots?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crCV2M26veo[/youtube]

[dobrojim]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

got agree with you Ruz. Us fans suffer bad health on our favorite players
and feel the need to blame someone. Maybe $#!+ just happens. Yes there
are teams that seem to suffer fewer injuries than others. But that is just
what you'd expect when predicting this sort of thing.

Most players have more money than God and can see anybody they
want to. But somehow it's the team that is at fault when things go
badly.

Heck I heard Snyder puts the Redskin medical staff out to the
highest bidder since the players see who they like anyway.

re Sibley and JH (my alma mater for my MS) - unless they
go in and clean house wrt staff, I suspect nothing would change.
Mgmt in the medical services can make the company more or less
money, but in many cases probably doesn't change medical outcomes
much.That said I heard a surgeon wrote a book about having checklists
and how much mandating using checklists actually did improve outcomes
when looking at a particular institution overall. Probably doesn't impact
individual outcomes for high profile athletes much though.

[montestewart]

My view of the Wizards medical staff issues is: 1) it's possible that the Wizards Medical staff is as bad as it often appears to be, and it's not so hard to believe that, because Pollin long seemed to run the Bullets/Wizards as a mom and pop organization, failing to spend money where it was needed and at times showing loyalty to individual staff to the detriment of the organization; and 2) regardless of the reality of the above appearance, the perception is there, and that results not only from the seemingly inordinate number of injuries, apparently missed diagnoses, and far from clearly reported team medical information, but also from the comments of former players.

Maybe the medical staff is not so bad, maybe it's even better than average. I don't have the sports medicine management background to judge that, and I don't have enough information. But I don't need any of that to judge the message the team is conveying to the public and particularly to its fans. I am in a better position than they are to judge the message I'm getting, and if the team is not doing a poor job addressing team health, it could certainly do a better job of conveying that.

[go'stags]

Besides the thing that you can infer from reading about the Wiz all over the internet (such as Gil), there have been numerous blurbs online stating exactly what we are- the Wiz medical staff is incompetent.

I disticntly remember reading that Etan and Javaris both were very unhappy with the Wiz medical staff-injuuries were misdiangnosed, and generally lackluster. I don't have the links,but I remember. There were also way more rumors about other mishaps. Generally, where there is so much smoke, and evidence, there has got to be fire. A big, smokey, clusterf*** of a fire.

I was actually hopng this thread was going to contain posters with a better memory than I saying some of the very bad things we have read. And some of the betters writers getting together to write Ted a well thought out e-mail detailing the performance of the medical staff. Maybe that can still happen?

[Dat2U]

Does anyone here have the background to know even a little bit of what they're talking about when they criticise the "Wizards medical staff"?

got agree with you Ruz. Us fans suffer bad health on our favorite players
and feel the need to blame someone. Maybe $#!+ just happens. Yes there
are teams that seem to suffer fewer injuries than others. But that is just
what you'd expect when predicting this sort of thing.

Most players have more money than God and can see anybody they
want to. But somehow it's the team that is at fault when things go
badly.

At some point though dobrojim, when enough players have complained about it, you have to take notice.

The deal with Rip Hamilton was in the Detroit newspapers years back. The Pistons doctor stated that that Rip had the incorrect procedure to fix his broken nose. The Wiz doctors performed the surgery as if he was a regular patient instead of an elite athlete. They shaved down his nose not considering the fact he plays a contact sport, putting him at risk to further injury if he ever got hit there. Because of the Wizards doctors he was forced to wear a mask for the rest of his career. That's just inexcusable.

There's been far too many occasions when a Wizards player has suffered an injury, gets treated by our medical staff and eventually goes out and suffers a more serious injury in the same troubled area down the line. (see Pech, Kwame & Jarvis)

There's also been far too many occasions when a Wizards player suffers an injury, gets treated by our medical staff and shortly thereafter re-injures or aggravates that previous injury. (see Gil on multiple occasions, Etan, Caron)

Like go stags said, when there's smoke, there's fire. If this is left unchecked, unfortunately the wreckage will continue to grow. The Wizards shell out too many millions of dollars in their players for this to be left unchecked. Even you don't think the medical staff is a major issue, wouldn't it be prudent to ensure the guys you've invested in have the best care possible?

I'll see if I can find the older thread we had on this which went into some details regarding specific incidents.