History of sports medicine - 1938
1938
American Arlie Bock (1888-1984), director of the Department of Hygiene at Harvard University, wondered whether studying sick people was only half of the story. He decided to turn this research on its head by studying young healthy men.
“All admit that the sick need care, but very few apparently have thought it necessary to make a systematic inquiry as to how people keep well and do well.”
1938
An article from an American newspaper reported on the work capacity of an athlete, which a research team at Stanford University measured during a bicycle test. The bike was connected to a dynamometer that converted the effort of the legs into horsepower. The athlete wore a copper helmet in which measured air was pumped, the exhaled air was sucked out to determine oxygen consumption and carbon dioxide production. After 45 minutes of cycling, it appeared that the subject had inhaled and exhaled a volume of 20 gallons of air per minute, and his pulse was 195 beats per minute. In addition, one quarter of a gallon of blood was pumped through the heart every minute and his work output was one quarter horsepower.
1938
In 1938, the article 'Physical Fitness and Citizenship' by the American Professor of Physical Education Charles H. McCloy (1886-1959) appeared in the Journal of Health, Physical Education, and Recreation.
1938
Flandrien Lucien Storme (1916-1945) won the cycling race Paris-Roubaix in 1938. Afterwards he was massaged by his private attendant Aimé Bethune. In 1942 he was arrested by the Germans as a resistance fighter and imprisoned in the Strafgefängenisser Siegburg at twenty kilometers from Köln. During the liberation, the Americans accidentally shot him dead.
1938
M.E. Missal was the first to use the two-step exercise ECG for studying angina pectoris. He examined normal patients by allowing them to climb three to six steps; he was probably the first to use a maximum stress test. For the sake of convenience Missal later opted for the Master's 9-inch step to let his patients practice to the limit. He emphasized the need to make an ECG as soon as possible. He quoted a case report in which the stress test had contributed to the treatment of a woman with hypothyroidism and angina pectoris who had previously had an attack of angina and ST segment depression through the use of a thyroid hormone. Missal also described the use of the master test in evaluating increases in exercise tolerance after nitroglycerin.
1938
The physical condition of American mid-distance runner Sid Robinson (1902-1982) was tested on a treadmill in the Harvard Fatigue Laboratory while coupled to a device that recorded oxygen uptake and heart rate.
