NurseWeek | HealthWeek Bitin' the bullet no more Injured rodeo cowboys cozy up to on-site health care

Bitin’ the bullet
no more
Injured rodeo cowboys cozy up
to on-site health care

By Diane Sussman
June 26, 2000


	You've read the article. Now tell us what you think. What ails ’em Cowboys – and we’re not talking just about the male variety – routinely get banged, bruised, stepped on, butted and gored. Bull riding, bareback riding, saddle bronc and bullfighting cause the most injuries, with the spine, knee and shoulder the most likely areas to become injured. The high number of concussions has prompted some in the industry to call for the use of helmets. But the practice hasn’t caught on, and probably won’t until someone designs a beaded or feathered 10-gallon helmet. The Justin Sportsmedicine Program, which treats rodeo participants on-site, ranks rodeo injuries in this order: Concussion Chest or rib fracture/ lung injury Shoulder fracture or dislocation Knee ligaments Ankle fracture Cervical spine, possible fracture Wrist fracture or dislocation Tibia or fibula fracture Elbow dislocation or fracture Abdominal/spleen/ liver injury Facial or jaw fracture Hand fracture or laceration Humerus fracture Foot fracture Femur fracture Lumbar fracture Clavicle fracture Ulna or radius fracture Hip fracture Scapula fracture Fatal chest injury Fatal head injury Gastric rupture Thumb amputation - Diane Sussman For more information So, you want to help care for a cowboy. Don Andrews, executive director of the Justin Sportsmedicine Program, says health professionals who want to volunteer when the rodeo is in town should contact the local rodeo committee chairperson and ask to speak to the medical director of the rodeo. If there is no rodeo chairperson, try local charity clubs such as Rotary or Lions, which often sponsor rodeos. Finally, if the area has no local volunteer medical group, health professionals can always volunteer to set one up, Andrews said. Legend has it that cowboys appreciate such things.

A typical rodeo event lasts only 8 seconds, but that’s plenty of time to wreck a body with contusions, dislocations, torn ligaments, punctured lungs, ruptured organs and concussions.

Photo: John Foscalina

There’s a saying among professional rodeo riders: If they ever woke up feeling good, they’d go to a hospital. Take Mark Gomes, whose groin ripped loose from his pelvic bone riding bareback bronc. "It’s still unattached," he said.

But did that stop the Nickerson, Kan., cowboy from going pelvis to pony in the ring? On the contrary, Gomes described his injury last week from Las Vegas, where he was competing in the grueling Copenhagen Cup.

"In rodeo, it’s not a question of if they’ll get injured, but when," said Don Andrews, executive director of the Justin Sportsmedicine Program, based in Mesquite.

Founded in 1980, the Justin Sportsmedicine Program is the official sports medicine provider at most major Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association events and the National Finals Rodeo. The program was founded by Andrews and J. Pat Evans, MD, former team physician for that other kind of Dallas cowboy – the ones who play football.

Since its inception, the program has grown from a lone truck and trailer rig to one with permanent digs at the Mesquite Championship Rodeo and the Lazy E Arena in Guthrie, Okla., and has established a traveling program that goes to 125 rodeos a year. At distant rodeos, Justin augments its specialized staff of physicians, physical therapists and athletic trainers with local EMTs, ERs and volunteer medical personnel.

By the time the trailer hits town, "we have pre-established local sports medicine specialists and hospitals," Andrews said.

LaLani Dockter, RN, a certified diabetes educator at Presbyterian/St. Luke’s Medical Center in Denver, has been working rodeos and stock shows for 18 years. "It’s dusty and dirty and there’s horse hair all over the place, but it’s completely different from what I do every day," she said. "It’s fun."

Filling a void
Before the Justin program, rodeo kings and queens dealt with their injuries the cowboy way – with a couple of Band-Aids and a bullet to bite. "There was nothing," said Bill Chambers, a certified athletic trainer from Palm Desert, Calif., who works for Justin.

The program has fine-tuned caring for cowboys, whose injuries can’t be compared to those of any other sport. "There’s no other sport where your competitor outweighs you tenfold," Andrews said. "If a linebacker steps on you, it’s not likely to do a whole lot of damage. And you’re unlikely to have a fatality in football."

"It’s an extreme sport is what it is," Chambers said. "The whole competition lasts maybe 30 minutes. Each event lasts about 8 seconds. And very few make it the whole 8 seconds."

Those 8 seconds are enough to wreck a body, causing contusions, dislocations, torn ligaments, punctured lungs, ruptured organs and concussions. "You see more trauma in a rodeo weekend than you see in an entire season of football or basketball," said certified athletic trainer and 19-year Justin veteran Larry Gardner, PT.

Thank you, ma’am
"These guys go out there and compete with injuries most professional athletes would never compete with," Chambers said. "They don’t have contracts like other sports. If they don’t compete, they don’t make money."

"I gotta say, the taping we do, the splints we make, it’s not exactly the way we were taught in school," Gardner said. "But what you learn first is that the rodeo cowboy is going to perform."

Which is why the Justin staff knows better than to try to talk them into retiring – even for a day. "To be effective, you have to understand the uniqueness of the rodeo," Andrews said. "We try to bridge the gap between the old way, which was telling a cowboy – or cowgirl – to go home for 12 weeks. We tell them to take three weeks off, and help them get back to work."

By and large, however, cowboys are not bullheaded about treatment. "They appreciate anything we do," Dockter said. "And they’re polite. Everything is ‘yes, ma’am; no, ma’am.’

"But don’t ever come at their chaps or jeans with scissors, even in an emergency," she continued. "They are very protective about their clothes."