Equipment, drugs and problems of the competition and team physician

Physicians nowadays commonly attend sports competitions or journeys with a sports team. In some competitions the rules ensure the attendance of a physician. The team physician has to take care of all kinds of medical problems within the team, while the competition physician basically takes care of acute complaints. The competition physician must organise the medical coverage of both athletes and spectators, also taking into account medical emergencies. In addition he should inform the teams and spectators about the medical coverage. The team physician must also perform a precompetition health screening of individual team members, and take care of infection prophylaxis before and during journeys. Usually the physician carries drugs for respiratory infections, antibiotics, anti-inflammatory drugs, gastrointestinal medications, antihistamines, eyedrops, local anaesthetics and dermatological medications. The physician's bag should not include banned substances, other than specially labelled emergency medications. The inclusion of other medications and equipment and the need for other medical resources is highly dependent on the length of the journey, the destination, the type of sports, and the number of participants and spectators. Each sport has its characteristic injury profile and there are also sport-specific regulations which the physician must be aware of. Acute injuries are more common in contact sports, and overuse injuries in non-contact sports. In addition to musculoskeletal injuries, other conditions such as heat exhaustion and dehydration may be encountered, while cold can also cause special problems.