The residency is a cooperative undertaking, with Russ working under the tutelage of Lynn Snyder-Mackler, physical therapy, and orthopedic surgeon Michael Axe, a clinical associate professor in the program. Others involved include Kevin Waninger, director of the University Sports Medicine Program, and Keith Handling, head athletic trainer. For example, when a baseball pitcher was injured, Russ was involved at the start of his treatment. After the initial therapy, it became clear that surgery was required. Axe arranged with the Medical Center of Delaware to permit physical therapy students in the operating room so that Russ observed the surgery first-hand.
Therapists get an actual view of the involved tissues and how the muscles are reconstructed.
Tests also can be performed under anesthesia that otherwise could not be carried out. Russ then was involved in the postsurgery recovery and rehabilitation period, prescribing therapy and home exercises. The happy ending was that the pitcher was once again on the mound this spring. The purpose of the residency is for Russ to become a consultant, with experience and knowledge of complex cases beyond the common kinds of sports injuries, Snyder-Mackler said. The variety of experience he is exposed to in an intense, one-year residency in an educational format would ordinarily take him several years in routine practice.