How can exercise help treat injuries and chronic diseases? How can athletes recover better after injuries? Why do high-performance athletes require specialized and individualized medical intervention? What are the latest developments in sports performance? How can sports contribute to the lives of people with disabilities?
These are just a few of the questions more than 90 distinguished international speakers discussed at the Sports Medicine 360° conference, which took place on March 14 and 15 in Athens at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center (SNFCC). The two-day event was attended by more than 850 people who learned about the latest developments in the field of sports medicine and sports sciences.
As part of the conference, remarks were given by, among others, Greece’s Deputy Minister of Health, Marios Themistocleous, who said, “Sports medicine is a rapidly evolving scientific field, which is not only concerned with injury rehabilitation or performance enhancement, but also with the prevention and treatment of chronic diseases through exercise. Exercise and a healthy lifestyle play a key role in the overall health of every human being. Physical activity contributes not only to maintaining good physical fitness, but also to reducing the risk of serious illness, enhancing mental well-being and improving overall quality of life.”
Dr. Panagiotis Koulouvaris, President of the Organizing Committee of the Sports Medicine 360° Congress, head of the nonprofit Regeneration & Progress, and Associate Professor in Orthopedic Surgery and Traumatology at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA), said, “Sports Excellence at the 1st Orthopedic Clinic of NKUA has conducted over 10,000 evaluations of athletes and over 5,000 therapeutic exercise sessions with patients in the last two-and-a-half years. Through the international partnerships that we have established with the continuous support of the Stavros Niarchos Foundation [...], our goal is to ensure that athletes, patients and practitioners of all levels and ages have good feedback and access to the best health, sport and holistic support services.”
The conference also featured a workshop for coaches, trainers, physical educators, and health professionals on evaluating and improving athletic performance, preventing injuries—including for people with mobility impairments—and therapeutic exercise for patients with chronic diseases.
The conference was organized by Regeneration & Progress’s Sports Excellence | 1st Orthopedic Clinic of the Medical School of Athens and the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA), under the auspices of the Ministry of Education, Religious Affairs and Sports – General Secretariat of Sports; the Hellenic Olympic Committee; the Hellenic Paralympic Committee; and the Hellenic Association of Orthopaedic Surgery & Traumatology. It was supported by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF) as the exclusive funder of Regeneration & Progress.