JUST as in all areas of learning, the objectives of sports have evolved from the needs of the individuals that the sport serves. It is from these objectives that the content and structure of a sport program is developed. The fact, that the viewpoint of young athletes and enthusiast of present day sport is generally limited to their own personal experiences and those of their friends.
More often than not, this represents their rather limited viewpoint of the actual scope of the sport they indulge themselves in. Thus many are surprised to find that their field of sport has much more to offer than what they experienced.
The sports myth and belief “no pain no gain” or “no fear” for example may connote the basic understanding that beginners and advanced athletes should comprehend the relationship that indulging themselves in sport means going through a lot of sacrifices and pain that goes on through their preparation as athletes and their future as one.
This belief of athletes nowadays’ may be correlated to injuries sustained by athletes during practices and tournaments, in the process the responsibility to care for this injuries rest in the hands of coaches and trainers as well as sports officials in general. However, while accidents happen, the snail paced education or even negligence of sports personnel’s and athletes to update their skills in first aid, limits their ability to handle such occurrences of injuries.
The duties of coaches and trainers aside from giving adequate instructions and supervision must then follow progressive, professional procedures, especially care and safety of athletes which does not end here. In practice and during tournaments accidents happen, coaches, trainers and officials during tournaments are bound to handle such occurrences without creating undue risks.
In as much as safety considers a lot of factors like equipment, supervision and instructions, proper techniques of performance, etc., coaches and trainers as well as tournament officials during tournaments must know and be updated with their first aid training, and must have emergency procedures to follow.
It is impossible to prevent accidents and injuries completely, and while coaches, trainers and tournament officials are given the responsibility to prevent such it is their task to administer care to injured, prevent further injury, to lessen pain and to prevent shock. Their responsibilities might be onerous and overwhelming, however, no one expect any less of one who is responsible for the welfare and educating athletes.