Peanut butter and jelly. Movies and popcorn. The beach and a hot, sunny day.
Some combinations are just meant to be.
The same can be said for Dr. Matt Roth, who combined his love for sports and helping people into what he practices today: sports medicine.
“Getting into the medical field really was an altruistic thing,” Roth says. “I always thought I had the ability to do something good."
"It was kind of my way of giving back and using my talents to help other people.” - Dr. Matt Roth
Growing up, like a lot of his peers, Roth competed in a variety of sports. From basketball to running, he participated as a young child all the way through high school. Still, though, in his words, he was “never quite big enough or fast enough to do the whole sports thing.”
Roth’s athletic limitations meant he had to pursue different avenues. He had always done well academically and loved to learn, so he decided to give medicine a shot.
At first, Roth says he didn’t know how he would incorporate sports into his practice and thought he would maybe be the “hometown doctor that helped with the high school team.” After earning his medical degree from The Ohio State University College of Medicine and Public Health and completing his family medicine residency at ProMedica Toledo Hospital, Roth started considering sports medicine, and his career took off.
Roth practices family and sports medicine at Arrowhead Family Physicians in Maumee, but that’s far from his only endeavor. He has worked with the Toledo Walleye hockey players as the team physician for the past nine years. He’s there on the sidelines at every home game to assist with injuries to both Walleye and opposing players, which “creates an interesting dynamic,” he says.
As the AA minor league affiliate of the Detroit Red Wings, the Walleye team is a stop on many players’ roads to the NHL. With players wanting to showcase their talents on a game-by-game basis, sometimes through injuries, Roth sometimes must be the one to keep their long-term health in mind.
Because the hockey community is fairly small, Roth says his work with the Walleye has been a great way to both learn the sport and network into the greater Toledo community, including Maumee, for his practice at Arrowhead.
“That’s (been a) really great experience,” Roth says. “Not only learning more about the culture of hockey and the different levels and higher-level athletes but just being involved and using that a little bit as a platform to the community.”
At his office in Maumee, Roth sees athletes of all ages, representing numerous schools and playing a variety of sports. Though hockey players visit him through referrals from the Walleye, Roth also treats runners, football players and everything in between.
In contrast to his own childhood experiences, Roth increasingly sees student-athletes choose to specialize in a single sport. Along with the absence of stress on certain muscle groups caused by doing one thing over and over, and the skill transfer that playing multiple sports can provide, he says multi-sport participation helps young athletes find their niche at a later age.
“Kids change and evolve, and their skill set and coordination kind of evolves over time,” he says.
“You don’t know where they’re going to end up, so putting all your eggs in one basket is not necessarily a good idea.” - Dr. Matt Roth
Though treatment of injuries makes up a large portion of his patients, Roth says one of his favorite parts about being a sports physician is the health and prevention aspect of it. One of his main goals for his patients is getting them back to being active because he says, lots of chronic diseases and illnesses are the result of inactivity.
One injury that Roth works hard to both treat and prevent, and that he says gets more focus than any other, is concussions. Roth says that while “football gets the most attention” regarding concussions, he and his colleagues “see it in any sport,” with hockey being a major one.
Education can be challenging when it comes to concussions, he says. Often, Roth sees patients and their parents or other family members who think concussions are subtle injuries that heal swiftly or, on the opposite end of the spectrum, debilitating traumas from which the athlete will never recover.
Roth’s hands-on experience and expertise with concussions have led him to be a go-to option for doctors at ProMedica Toledo Hospital when they encounter more difficult cases, such as those of patients with multiple or severe concussions. A lot of his work with concussions has to do with educating the public.
Dr. Julie Miller, a pediatric physician also at ProMedica Toledo Hospital, has worked with Roth for the past few years treating head trauma and increasing the education and awareness surrounding it.
Miller – who primarily works with patients who have suffered from head trauma as the result of accidents, collisions or abuse – says Roth’s recognition in the Toledo community both for his work with the Walleye and his expertise in treating concussions comes in handy when a second opinion is needed.
“If there’s a patient or parent that doesn’t particularly agree with my diagnosis and treatment, I know I can go to Matt for a second opinion, and we usually agree on the best course of treatment.” - Dr. Julie Miller
Roth’s goal in his family practice is to bring more awareness to youth sports and the long-term effects that injuries can have on a child or teen’s body. His talk for TEDxToledo (Technology, Entertainment, and Design) in 2014 centered on this very topic and the need to rethink youth sports, and he says athletes and their parents need to think deeply about the end goal of a youth athlete’s career in sports.
“Is the risk of getting back onto the field at times worth it when it could potentially jeopardize the patient’s future and plans for further education?” Roth says.
Zachary Konno is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.
About the Expert
Matt Roth, MD, is a board-certified physician who specializes in family medicine and sports medicine with ProMedica Physicians. He is also medical director of ProMedica Wellness. Dr. Roth earned a doctor of medicine degree at The Ohio State University College of Medicine. He completed a residency in family medicine at ProMedica Toledo Hospital as well as the ProMedica Toledo Hospital Primary Care Sports Medicine Fellowship. Dr. Roth is a member of the American College of Sports Medicine, American Academy of Family Physicians and the American Medical Association.
