The Beginning of the American Medical Society of Sports Medicine
In 1991, five family physicians with strong self-learned sports medicine training and experience, Drs. David Hough, John Lombardo, Doug McKeag, Lee Rice, and Jim Puffer, sought to find a medical organization that would represent themselves and other like-minded physicians. After unsuccessful meetings with numerous groups, including the American College of Sports Medicine, American Academy of Family Physicians, and finding inadequate representation and support of their sports medicine interests, they elected to start their own specialized organization. Initially coined the PCSSM, the Primary Care Society for Sports Medicine, 17 additional physicians, representing the broad range of specialties of family medicine, internal medicine, emergency medicine, pediatrics, and physical medicine and rehabilitation, met at the Dallas Airport to brainstorm and inaugurate this new group. They also each invested $2000 of their personal savings into a seed fund for this new organization.
The 20 Founders of AMSSM included:
1. Randall Eichner, MD, Internal Medicine
2. Elizabeth Gallup, MD, JD, Family Medicine
3. Brian Halpern, MD, Family Medicine
4. Jack Harvey, MD, Pediatrics
5. John Henderson, DO, Family Medicine
6. Stan Herring, MD, Physical Medicine and Rehab
7. David Hough, MD, Family Medicine (deceased)
8. Robert Johnson, MD, Family Medicine
9. Greg Landry, MD, Pediatrics
10. John Lombardo, MD, Family Medicine
11. Doug McKeag, MD, Family Medicine
12. Larry McLain, MD, Pediatrics
13. Robert Murphy, MD, Internal Medicine (deceased)
14. James Puffer, MD, Family Medicine
15. Lee Rice, DO, Family Medicine
16. Douglas Shaw, MD, Emergency Medicine
17. Deborah Squire, MD, Pediatrics
18. Mitch Story, DO, Family Medicine
19. Richard Strauss, MD, Internal and Preventive Medicine (deceased)
20. Jeffrey Tanji, MD, Family Medicine
AMSSM's First Annual Meeting was held in San Diego in July 1992, with Dr. Brian Halpern MD as the guarantor, which held him personally responsible if the meeting failed monetarily. However, the rest of the Founders all verbally agreed to help cover any losses. However, this first meeting was a success! The approximately 120 physicians who attended, all trained in primary care specialties, had finally found an organization which supported their beliefs that they had a central role in providing high quality sports medicine care. By our 16 th Annual Meeting in Albuquerque in 2007, almost 800 physicians attended the conference, and our membership had grown to 1124 members. Thanks to the early vision and strong commitment of the dedicated Founders, AMSSM has become a strong, vital, multi-disciplinary organization of physicians, whose members are dedicated to education, research, collaboration and fellowship within the field of Sports Medicine.
