photo by: Chad Lawhorn/Journal-World

Allen Fieldhouse is pictured in this file photo from December 2021.

Kansas’ six major universities will undergo a review of their athletic trainers and doctors as the sports world has faced multiple allegations of abuse or inappropriate care by medical professionals.

The Kansas Board of Regents on Tuesday created a new task force that will review the athletic training programs of the University of Kansas, Kansas State, Wichita State, Emporia State, Fort Hays State and Pittsburg State.

The review comes after the board earlier this year conducted a study of the universities’ student health centers. But that task force did not delve into the medical care provided within athletic departments, and Regents previously had said it would be a mistake to not review that care, which in the case of KU and other large schools impacts hundreds of student-athletes who undergo everything from major surgeries to routine locker room-type of treatments.

Board members at their brief Tuesday morning meeting did not specifically highlight any of the high-profile cases that have rocked some athletic programs, including one at the University of Michigan that resulted in a $490 million settlement with more than 1,000 people who say a longtime sports doctor with the university sexually abused them.

Closer to home, a Lawrence massage therapist who had a contract with KU’s athletic department was convicted last year of committing sex crimes against five people. Three of the victims of massage therapist Shawn P. O’Brien were KU soccer players at the time of the incidents.

“I believe there was a clear recognition that we have a constituency, student-athletes, that we knew would need to be a separate process, and also are an important constituency we cover,” Regent Carl Ice said of the Regents’ past discussions related to the need for a review of athletic department training programs.

Among the items that will be reviewed:

• Ensuring that there is a process where concerns expressed by a student-athlete or others are investigated and acted upon.

• Determining whether athletic departments have an appropriate level of internal, periodic review of the athletic medical programs to ensure that they are adequately addressing the health and safety needs of student-athletes.

• Reviewing who is responsible within each university for ensuring that the athletic medical departments remain in compliance with NCAA regulations, which, among other things, require that a team physician be appointed and that the physician and associated team trainers have “unchallengeable, autonomous authority” to provide medical care to athletes, and make determinations such as when an athlete is cleared to return to athletic competition.

To oversee the review, the board created a new task force, but has not yet appointed any members to it. Instead, the president and CEO of the Regents was authorized to appoint a medical professional to serve as the chair of the task force, plus identify at least five other members who are familiar with college athletics, NCAA regulations and Title IX provisions to serve on the task force.

The task force is expected to deliver a report back to the Regents by June 2023.

In other news, the Regents approved nine maintenance and rebuilding projects on KU’s Lawrence campus. The largest project is a $15 million renovation of Robinson Center to convert underutilized space in the recreation center building into a new home for KU’s ROTC military programs. However, a KU official told the board that project was the most speculative of the nine projects, currently. The university has not yet secured funding for the project.

Mark Reiske, director of facilities planning and development at KU, said the university hoped to have funds in fiscal year 2024, which begins in July 2023, to begin design work on the Robinson Center project.

Editor’s Note: This article was corrected to change the date for when the state’s 2024 fiscal year begins.