Questions have been raised about safety after three Tufts University men’s lacrosse players remained hospitalized Monday with rare muscle injuries after participating in a team practice.
The players fell ill in the days following a “voluntary, supervised” workout led by a former Tufts player who recently graduated from the Navy Seal training program.
About 50 team members participated in the 45-minute workout. All were evaluated by medical professionals, with nine requiring hospitalization for rhabdomyolysis, said Patrick Collins, the university’s director of media relations.
“They are responding to treatment and we hope they will be discharged soon,” Collins said. “The university is taking this matter very seriously. It is appointing an independent investigator to conduct a thorough investigation as soon as possible to determine exactly what happened before, during and after the training; to assess the university’s response; and to review its procedures and policies to determine what changes it needs to make to prevent this from happening again.”
Some team members have been medically cleared to resume training. All team training has been postponed pending approval from university medical personnel.
Rhabdomyolysis, also called rhabdo, is a rare muscle injury that causes muscles to break down, causing toxic chemicals to enter the bloodstreamIt is a life-threatening condition that can occur after an injury or after excessive exertion without rest.
Several experts told the Boston Globe that there were serious questions about the training session.
“This is a failure of the strength and conditioning program – an epic failure,” said Douglas J Casa, executive director of the Korey Stringer Institute at the University of Connecticut, told the Globe. “Someone made a dramatic mistake in the way the training was organized in terms of intensity, volume, recovery. Something was dramatically wrong.”
Collins praised the team’s response to the incident. “The team is a close-knit group of young men who have shown remarkable resilience, understanding and care for each other during this episode,” he said. “We will continue to monitor and work with them closely, and we hope for a speedy return to good health for all involved.”
In 2011, 13 Iowa football players were hospitalized for rhabdo following an offseason workout, and in 2016 the university paid $15,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by one of the players. Colleges’ training methods have come under broader scrutiny in recent years, particularly as athletes train in warmer summer conditions.