By Shannon Collins DoD News, Defense Media Activity
TORONTO, Sept. 29, 2017 — Michael Burns, CEO of the Toronto Invictus Games, announced that Invictus, inward partnership amongst the Canadian Institute for Military as well as Veteran Health Research, is releasing the preliminary findings of the first-ever inquiry report on the impact of the usage of adaptive sports inward the rehabilitation of service members as well as their families.
The report “will render a platform for evidence-based policy making that volition back upward the farther evolution of sports programs as well as events for wounded warriors as well as veterans inward Canada as well as to a greater extent than or less the world,” Burns said.
‘First of its Kind’ Study
“This report is the commencement of its kind,” he added. “There’s never earlier been a comprehensive report of competitive sporting events developed for service members as well as veterans. The Invictus Games has a mission: to usage the ability of sports to inspire recovery, back upward rehabilitation as well as generate a wider agreement as well as abide by for those who served their countries as well as loved ones. We’re confident that doc Celina Shirazipour’s findings volition assist us empathise whether the Invictus Games are successful inward fulfilling that mission as well as that it volition ask hold us across the complete line.”
Burns said the Invictus Games uses the ability of sports to inspire recovery, back upward rehabilitation as well as broaden awareness of the unique issues that touching on people who serve their countries as well as families.
“We are delivering much to a greater extent than than only a high marking sport competition,” he said. “Adaptive sport is also a really effective shape of therapy for the soldiers who participate inward these games. The games commonly ask hold hundreds of competitors who prepare for months at a really high intensity to force themselves to perform to the limits of their abilities. The games inspire thousands of soldiers as well as veterans to maintain a positive outlook as well as to strive to gain to a greater extent than than what they thought possible.”
Research
Shirazipour is leading a sports psychology study, conducted yesteryear Dalhousie University as well as the Canadian Institute for Military as well as Veteran Health Research. The report volition explore the usage of competitive sport inward promoting psychological as well as social well-being for wounded, sick as well as injured service members as well as veterans as well as their families inward the curt as well as long term earlier as well as afterward the Invictus Games.
The inquiry squad is interviewing forty Canadian as well as international Invictus Games competitors, including the U.S. squad as well as their solid unit of measurement members. Competitors volition respond to a serial of questionnaires most their experiences preparation for as well as participating inward the games as well as the long-term effects of the games. The athletes ask hold injuries ranging from post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic encephalon injury as well as depression to amputation as well as spinal-cord or nervus damage.
This inquiry volition render a platform for evidence-based programme evolution as well as policy making to back upward the farther increase of sport programs as well as events delivered to wounded, sick as well as injured service members as well as veterans.
“The report volition also investigate how sport participation may influence service members’ as well as veterans’ reintegration into, as well as house in, society,” Shirazipour said.
Transformative Experience
“Sport is a transformative experience,” she said. “That transformation journeying tin last divided into iii parts, preparation earlier the games, the games themselves similar hither inward Toronto as well as life afterward the games. When the individuals brand the team, they’re motivated because they ask hold a squad relying on them. That’s that military machine mentality: ‘I can’t allow my squad down.’ The transformation starts because they ask hold to locomote out their house, detect a coach, larn to prepare as well as acquire on a team.”
Shirazipour said the games also give competitors, peculiarly those from countries that don’t back upward their military, the ask a opportunity to last celebrated as well as recognized.
“People are like, ‘They truly came to encounter me participate as well as encounter my recovery as well as produce my sport?’ It’s truly intangible,” she said.
Shirazipour also said that giving the competitors a ask a opportunity to stand upward for their countries i time again gives them a feel of self identity as well as a render to service.
“There are a lot of cardinal elements to larn from the initial study,” she said. “Some of these are the value of friends as well as solid unit of measurement as well as having competitors laid goals. Invictus tin render a transformative experience; this motivation to proceed as well as to comprise one’s psychological as well as social well-being.”
Army veteran Will Reynolds competed for the U.S. at the Invictus Games inward 2014 inward London, inward 2016 inward Orlando as well as this twelvemonth inward Toronto. He has also competed at the Department of Defense Warrior Games over the years as well as earned several medals inward rails as well as plain as well as cycling. He is an above-the-knee amputee.
“Research is of import because it helps convey the back upward as well as funding,” Reynolds said. “If nosotros tin inward an empirical means exhibit that this is helping people, which nosotros know it is, nosotros encounter all the swell success stories that come upward out of this. It’s solely going to assist create the back upward behind it thence every country’s equivalent to Veterans Affairs as well as Military Health tin maintain putting a lot of back upward behind it because it is that impactful on the whole population.”
The Department of Veterans Affairs holds vi national clinics a year, including wintertime as well as summertime sports clinics, Reynolds said. “They’ve been doing it for decades,” he said. “They encounter the benefit, as well as they truly desire to maintain it going for veterans. The Invictus Games is on an fifty-fifty bigger scale because this is international, as well as it’s for active duty equally well, thence it’s something else to bolster the programs they already encounter a lot of produce goodness in.”
Importance of Invictus
Britain’s Prince Harry said he began the Invictus Games afterward visiting a warrior attention facility when he visitedthe 2013 Warrior Games inward Colorado Springs, Colorado.
“I’m hugely passionate most the Invictus Games. I’m passionate most the usage back upward tin play inward the recovery of the torso as well as the mind,” he said. “I’m passionate most the men as well as women of our armed forces who ask hold served their countries, as well as I’m passionate inward my back upward as well as admiration for the families of them because they, too, ask hold served.”
When he commencement visited the warrior attention facility, the prince said “it was at that topographic point where I commencement saw the impact that sport could play inward recovering these men as well as women. I was amazed at seeing the fiercest contest plough into respect, agreement as well as friendship afterward the complete delineate of piece of job was crossed.”
The prince continued, “I saw people giving their all on the courtroom or inward the pool, but thence hugging their opponents equally brothers-in-arms. Seeing this myself convinced me that nosotros ask hold to enable to a greater extent than wounded, sick as well as injured service men as well as women to produce goodness from the ability of competition. And nosotros ask hold to detect a means to phase the contest that could attract the attending of the the world as well as inspire millions. The thought of the Invictus Games was born.”
Harry, who served inward the British Army for 10 years, including 2 deployments to Afghanistan, said he knows the journeying to the Invictus Games is non an tardily i for the competitors.
“People detect motivation inward many ways but inward my mind, there’s no denying the impact that teamwork, contest as well as fun has,” he said. “The married adult woman of a U.S. contender thanked me equally tears rolled downwards her face. She said, ‘My married adult man is on the [American] squad as well as when he’s amongst the team, I encounter him smile, a genuine smile. I call because his grinning is something we’ve been missing. Thank you lot for these games.’”
“We believe that the games ask hold made a existent difference,” the prince said. “Competitors, friends as well as their families told us that the games were non solely changing lives but saving lives. Sport, of course, is non the solely answer, but it is a powerful tool.”
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