Athletes and their support staff, International Olympic Committee (IOC) family, technical staff, contractors, volunteers, sponsors, media and spectators all are essential participants in the biggest festival of sport in the world. They all need healthcare, but the priority for the IOC and any organising committee of an Olympic Games (OCOG) is protecting the health of athletes. The demands of athletes are particularly great because of the unique nature and pressures of the Games. The Olympics should be a 4 year peak of fitness and health, but is at the same time a peak of stress.

The key to providing healthcare at an Olympic Games is good preparation and prevention with integration into all the other functional areas of an OCOG, as well as working with healthcare providers outside the Olympic Games environment. The Games are a mass gathering with all the public health risks and issues that involves....]]> 2013-04-10T21:27:07-07:00 info:doi/10.1136/bjsports-2013-092364 hwp:master-id:bjsports;bjsports-2013-092364 British Association of Sport and Excercise Medicine 2013-05-01 Editorials 47 7 401 401 http://bjsm.bmj.com/cgi/content/short/47/7/402?rss=1 It may not go down in history as the ‘miracle of London’ but the 2012 Paralympic Games truly brought about changes in attitudes towards people with disabilities that will be enduring. Going into the Games there were doubters, ‘do not carers’ and people ignorant to the achievements of Paralympians. The Olympic Games was an unqualified success but how would the nation and people around the world respond to the Paralympic Games?

The day after Sarah Storey won Great Britain's (GB) first gold medal she came into the GB Medical Centre to sign our medal board (figures 1–3). The front pages of the national newspapers were covered with her picture and the story of her gold medal performance. We knew that something had changed. Being a home games, there was certainly a greater media interest for ParalympicsGB going into the Games, but we were...]]> 2013-04-10T21:27:07-07:00 info:doi/10.1136/bjsports-2013-092340 hwp:master-id:bjsports;bjsports-2013-092340 British Association of Sport and Excercise Medicine 2013-05-01 Editorials 47 7 402 403 http://bjsm.bmj.com/cgi/content/short/47/7/404?rss=1

Medical services have been designed and implemented for a number of major sporting events in the recent years, including Sydney 20001, Athens 20042, Singapore 20103 and Innsbruck 2012.4 Within the published reports from these Games, little or no reference was made to the important role that pharmacy plays within each of the disciplines that constitute medical services.

The health protection of athletes is a crucial role for the International Olympic Committee.5 It is therefore important that medical services at major sporting events, such as Olympic and Paralympic Games are well-planned, comprehensive and robust. Consequently, the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) were tasked with providing these services. The Medical Services for London 2012 incorporated a specialist pharmacy work stream comprising a Pharmacy Planning Committee that had an advisory and operational role for the LOCOG...]]> 2013-04-10T21:27:07-07:00 info:doi/10.1136/bjsports-2013-092180 hwp:master-id:bjsports;bjsports-2013-092180 British Association of Sport and Excercise Medicine 2013-05-01 Editorials 47 7 404 406