Team Scotland appoints official dentist for Commonwealth games
Glasgow practice will make sure athletes are in peak dental health for Gold Coast 2018
A Glasgow clinic has become the first official dental practice for Team Scotland and will be supporting athletes in the build-up to the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Australia.
The Park Practice in the West End will be tasked with making sure the athletes selected for Gold Coast 2018 are in peak dental health and that those taking part in contact sports have the best and most appropriate dental protection in place.
Practice principal Mike Blackie launched the partnership with a briefing at Scotland’s Commonwealth Youth Games Team Camp in June ahead of the event that took place in the Bahamas in July.
He said: “The opportunity to work with Team Scotland combines my dual passions of dental health and sport in an exciting way. I am looking forward to developing the partnership over the next few years and seeing how I can support Scotland’s Commonwealth Games athletes to optimise their dental health.”
A former rugby player with GHL and Glasgow Hawks, Mike also worked as part of the medical team for the London 2012 Olympic Games supporting combat sports, was involved at Glasgow 2014 with the rugby sevens and has also worked with two premiership football clubs.
He said: “My role has developed to include oral health assessments, education on the potential impact of sugar levels on performance and increasing the understanding of the impact of trauma injuries. While we are still some way off from persuading all athletes in contact or combat sports to wear proper dentally fitted sports mouthguards, thankfully awareness of the benefits is increasing.
“More sporting bodies are realising the importance of looking after the ‘whole’ athlete to improve chances of success and I feel that this link-up with Team Scotland will be one of the extra percentage points the athletes need to fulfil their performance potential.”
1 Comment
This is one of the best decision, every team should maintain a dental specialist while playing games, if anything happens suddenly they need dental emergency treatment, of course there will be few doctors but they will not take care that much care compared to the doctors who appointed by us. Players also play freely and they will show their potentiality to win the game.