In high school, she participated in whatever sports the season offered and she continued those interests through college and into medical school at Northwestern. At Duke in 1982, while a chief resident in pediatrics, she was further inspired by doing a clinical fellowship with orthopedic surgeon Dr. Frank Bassett, who served as team physician for Duke intercollegiate athletes. After she became a Duke faculty member, Squire started the Pediatric Sports Medicine Clinic. At that time, she was one of the few pediatricians in the country to have a subspecialty in sports medicine. She also teaches and she travels almost every weekend during the school year with the field hockey and basketball teams.
Sports medicine is a dynamic field, with treatments that are constantly refined.
For example, not long ago a gymnast with a particular back injury would be put in a back brace for six months. Then, clinicians found only 6-8 weeks in a brace could be sufficient and now they know a similar period of rest with physical therapy without a brace may be adequate. To become even more effective, the field needs to develop practice guidelines, which are accepted, data-driven treatment procedures, and make them available to every family doctor, she said. They just aren't sure what to do. But Squire is equally interested in addressing the flip side of the coin - the children who don't exercise and setting themselves up for a completely different set of health problems.