Mission & Vision Statement

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Research Institute of Sport and Exercise Inc. Mission Statement

The Research Institute of Sport and Exercise, Inc. (“RISEInstitute”) is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to American athlete welfare research, education, and training. Our Board has many relationships in the local, regional, national, and global athletic communities encompassing various levels of several sports. The group is comprised of professionals from diverse backgrounds, including experts in sports science and medicine, traumatology, orthopedics, pain management, dieticians, athletic trainers, physiotherapists, and statisticians. Their focus is on obtaining the proper data needed to nurture health and safety in the U.S. sport playing and exercising population. Athlete welfare is a critical issue and is inherently entwined with the continued growth of athletics in America.

The RISE Institute’s goal is to analyze rates and causes of injuries in sports, on their levels of play, of many types of athletes, from gamers to rugby athletes to Paralympic athletes. This objective will allow leagues to develop injury prevention strategies with evidence-based, gender-focused and level specific data to improve athlete welfare.

Medical Advisory Board (RISE-MAB): Mission Statement

The RISE Institute Medical Advisory Board (RRIPG-MAB) is made up of healthcare professionals, medical officers, sports scientists and consultants from major clinical and scientific disciplines who have initially advised the northeastern geographic unions on athlete welfare, safety and medical matters for many years, with plans to advise all affiliated groups, teams, event planners, domestic or international governance or sporting unions on safety and injury prevention techniques.

The RISE-MAB will meet biannually and advise policies on athlete welfare and safety matters. The decision of the RISE-MAB to create this board was in its view of the current advancement and underrepresentation of injury prevention in a multitude of sports across the nation.

Sports governance have endorsed the drawing-up of sport-focused consensus statements on injury definitions and data collection procedures for studies of injuries in sports, including cricket, soccer, rugby, winter sports and in general all sports (IOC Injury and Illness) and the Para Athlete. These documents have been subsequently published jointly in major sports journals such as the British Journal of Sports Medicine and Clinical Journal of Sports Medicine since 2006. These consensus documents were intended as a guideline for use in all injury surveys, for interstudy comparability in sports.

A branch of the RISE Institute, our entity the Rugby Research and Injury Prevention Group, Inc, used the World Rugby Consensus document to comprise an updated tool—the Rugby Injury Survey and Evaluation (The RISE Report, published in AJSM 2012). The RISE report-tool captures the important foundational data collection necessary, from the consensus statement and added the biomechanical characteristics of rugby injuries, needed to analyze the sport further. The RISE report was created by the authors and takes into consideration many factors that are necessary to evaluate rugby injuries (see the Appendix, available online at http://ajs.sagepub.com/supplemental/). This format of injury surveillance also provides an efficient approach to ask injured athletes the risk factors associated with their injury.

This document was intended not to replace the World Rugby (formally the International Rugby Board)- Rugby Injury Consensus Group (RICG) consensus statement, but to incorporate what the RICG created and assess further the needed data to evaluate the mechanism of rugby injuries. The RISE report applying the RICG standards should ensure that more consistent and interstudy comparisons can and will be obtained from current and future studies of injuries in Rugby globally.

The RISE report has been used in all injury surveys carried out during rugby injury studies in the USA at minor and major sanctioned USA Rugby and USA Sevens LLC events attended by the RRIPG staff since 2009. Injury Surveys carried out include:

  1. Hip dislocations in Sports, published with Dr Steven Chudik, Dr Russel F Warren, Dr Victor Lopez Jr and Answorth A. Allen.
  2. A college and adult men’s seasonal club Rugby-15s comparative study carried out in 2010, presented at the Annual General Meeting of the USA Rugby Territorial RFU/Competitive Regions. These studies will be published. This project was funded by the USA Rugby Northeast competitive region (Empire Geographic Union (GU) Rugby Football Union (RFU) and New England GU RFU).
  3. A USA Rugby Territorial RFU/Competitive Region sponsored study in collaboration with Hospital for Special Surgery, “Profile of an American Amateur Rugby Union Sevens Series” carried out in 2010, published in the American Journal of Sports Medicine (online in 2011). This project was funded by the USA Rugby Northeast Competitive region. Lopez et al 2012 AJSM “Profile of an American Amateur Rugby Union Sevens Series” has been referenced in multiple manuscripts as per National Center for Biotechnology Information in PubMed Central® (PMC).
  4. Endorsed by USA Rugby and USA Sevens LLC to collect data at their major events: USA Club Rugby Championships 2009–2025, Las Vegas Invitational (2010–2019) and the Collegiate Rugby Championships (2011–2019), and the USA Club Rugby Qualifiers presently (across all 50 states) (2009–2025).
  5. A case-study, of a Rugby-15’s injury carried out with global interest in an under investigated area of study: Costal cartilage fractures and disruptions in a rugby football player, published in 2012 in Clinical Journal of Sports Medicine.
  6. The 3rd International Olympic Committee’s World Conference on Prevention of Injury and Illness in Sport, held in the Kingdom of Monaco, 2012’s presentation by Lyndon B. Gross, MD PhD, Chesterfield, Missouri. Gross LB, Lopez, Jr., V, Allen AA: Injuries (Shoulder) in Judo, Taekwondo and Rugby Sevens.
  7. A 4-year follow-up of U.S. Rugby Sevens injuries (2010–2013) in Orthopedic Journal Sports Medicine. 2014, in Orthopedic Journal of Sports Medicine, on our USA Rugby Territorial RFU/Competitive Regions and major USA Rugby sanctioned events.
  8. First to present on the topic of rugby and its injuries at the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine (AOSSM) the world leader in sports medicine education, research, communication, and fellowship, working closely with many other sports medicine specialists, including athletic trainers, physical therapists, family physicians, and others to improve the identification, prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation of sports injuries. During its 2014 Annual Meeting/Final Program, Seattle, WA. on An American Experience with a New Olympic Collision Sport: Rugby Sevens, Orthopedic Journal Sports Medicine. This project was funded by Hospital for Special Surgery, the USAR Northeast TU and aid from USA Sevens LLC.
  9. The trade media outlet Orthopedics Today interviewed Dr. Victor Lopez Jr., DO, who “Expands on a study regarding injuries to rugby players..”
  10. Presented at the USA Rugby Medical Symposium, on a national scale of injuries in Rugby-7s, at the 2014 Annual Meeting
  11. RRIPG in 2014 began collaborating with the internationally known Auckland University of Technology’s Sports Performance Research Institute New Zealand (AUT/SPRINZ). They collaborate with many entities, including World Rugby and its IRB Health Study in conjunction with New Zealand Rugby Union to provide detailed information to colleagues globally on their findings and present at all major scientific conferences. The leaders of this group, were some of the presenters at the special section on injury prevention in Rugby Union, at the 2nd IOC World Conference on Prevention of Injury and Illness in Sport in Tromso, Norway June 26 – 28 2008. Including World Rugby (IRB) who were co-sponsors with other major federations.
  12. With our advancing understanding of the sport, we have been made members of the Auckland University of Technology’s Sports Performance Research Institute New Zealand, Rugby Codes Interdisciplinary Research Group (Highlighted in Auckland University’s Rugby Codes Interdisciplinary Research Group e-Mag Issue 4 22.09.16). This is an international group with aims of collaborating with groups and institutions globally and conveying information on rugby codes advancing science and injury prevention to peers in science of rugby and the public.
  13. The first analysis carried out in 2015 on Concussions in US Rugby-7s published by the American College of Sports Medicine’s journal of cutting-edge research: Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise (MSSE), ACSM’s flagship monthly journal, is the leading multidisciplinary original research journal for members. Each issue features original investigations, clinical studies and comprehensive reviews on current topics in sports medicine and exercise science.
  14. The first global manuscript dedicated to women’s injuries in US Rugby-7s tournaments, published in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise (MSSE).
  15. Our progress has been highlighted at the internationally attended American College of Sports Medicine Annual Meeting consecutively over 2015 to 2025 consecutively.
  16. In 2021–2023 Lopez et al has presented at major Sports Medicine Conferences: the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) World Conference on Prevention of Injury and Illness in Sport, the 2017 11th Biennial ISAKOS Congress and the internationally attended American College of Sports Medicine Annual Meeting.
  17. We have been honored to be the 2021 IOC Workshop presenters on “Rugby-7s Injury Prevention,” as the first US based group to present data at IOC standards, to the 205 National Olympic Committees.
  18. Adelphi Science and Technology Entry Program (STEP)/Collegiate (C)STEP: Clinical Research Instructor.
  19. New York 7s Invitational attendance as HSS/RRIPG medical staff.
  20. Mentors in Medicine: 2024 & 2025: Presenter and Chair for Alumni Symposium

Steering and Advisory Board (RISE-SAB): Mission Statement

The RISE Steering and Advisory Board (RISE-SAB) board is composed of many professionals, incorporating the business sector, sports management, and athletic arena, many with a direct involvement in a sports group or entity, to provide the RISE Institute and its officers with strategic direction and applicable guidance.

  1. To monitor the current and future plans of the group. Plans for dissemination regarding updates, statements and guidance notes created.
  2. The Board is to oversee the production, functionality, management and deployment of the work and data-collection sites of the Research Institute of Sport and Exercise.
  3. Work conjointly with local, national and global governance, groups, and affiliates to address sports injury issues as they impact of the athlete welfare and safety risk in the US sport-playing population and how it may influence the current rules and policy.
  4. Work conjointly with local, national and global entities and liaison with other key healthcare organizations that can assist guidance in the Boards work.
  5. Bridge the RISE Institute into further aims in researching relevant sports medicine and science concerns to nurture the many sports played in the US.
  6. Aid in the development of positional statements and guidance notes to assist the RISE Institute in making evidence-based and sound decisions to decrease risk for participation.
  7. Maintain and administer a national sports injury surveillance system. RISE-MAB will analyze and interpret the scientific injury data. This collected information will allow the RISE Institute to provide and employ evidence-based injury prevention protocols to various US sport leagues and communities with the intent to reduce risk through possible changes in rules and/or equipment involved in the sport.
  8. Provide the RISE Administrators and membership current information on sports medicine issues through the RISE Rugby Updates, the Sports Medicine section of the RISE Institute web site and through other RISE Institute publications.