Physiotherapist acts as sport-injury detective

By Christopher Drexel

Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2008 | 12:30 a.m.

The walls of Bob Donatelli's southwest Las Vegas office are lined with autographed pictures of professional athletes he has helped rehabilitate injuries.

Athletes such as Dale Murphy, Terence Newman, Andy Roddick and Natalie Gulbis are a few of the famous clients he has treated over the last 15 years. Since relocating from Atlanta to Las Vegas in 2005, Donatelli, an orthopedic certified specialist, has treated countless local athletes, varsity athletes and gymnasts.

He has earned a reputation for developing new methods, mostly dealing with sports specific movements, to help athletes get back on the field as quick as possible following an injury.

"I haven't met an athlete yet that has been playing their sport three or four years that does not break down," Donatelli said. "I really believe they need a specialist to come in and find out where they've broken down, where their weak areas are. Too many times training represents just doing plain exercises."

Donatelli begins treatment with an evaluation that includes muscle testing, flexibility testing and balance testing. He will then develop exercises to pinpoint target areas.

It's a method Donatelli said is not often used in sports rehab. Case in point, Donatelli recentely took on Milwaukee Brewers pitcher and Summerlin resident David Riske as a patient.

He said Riske had rehabbed injuries with position players in the past and later developed back and elbow injuries. But Donatelli put him on a program specific for pitchers and the pitcher's condition greatly improved.

"You have to be a detective," Donatelli said. "You can't just dream up exercises you think are appropriate without doing an evaluation first. That's a shotgun approach. Without pinpointing weaknesses you may be strengthening muscles that don't need to be strengthened and creating a muscle imbalance, a lack of flexibility."

Nicole Sherman, a Desert Oasis sophomore and level 9 gymnast from Brown's Gymnastics, had sprained her ankle for the fourth time before meeting with Donatelli last month. Donatelli put Sherman on a rehab routine designed to strengthen her ankles. It including sliding on a sideways elliptical machine and standing on one foot on a balance board.

"The balance board is big because we have a lot of balance issues in gymnastics, so it helps stabilize my ankles," Sherman said. "It's been helping because I'm back to gymnastics a lot faster than I would without the therapy."

Caleb Cline, a swimmer for the Boulder City-Henderson Heatwave, had been slowed for a year since breaking his femur bone while playing freshman football at Las Vegas High. He went to Donatelli, who insisted Cline get out of the pool for a month in June to rehab. The news initially left Cline in tears, but he is glad he took the advice.

"It took me off guard because most swim coaches just preach you need to swim and swim and swim some more and you need to do dry land training," Cline said. "After that month with Bob, I went back to practice and was beating kids that had been beating me for months."

Donatelli put Cline on exercises that mimic arm strokes in a pool and pushing off the wall of the pool on machines in his office that can't be found at any normal gym. Even though he is healed, Cline continued to train with Donatelli.

"Bob is kind of like a secret weapon," Cline said. "He's always trying to come up with new things to make you better and give you the edge you want to have on the competition."

Christopher Drexel can be reached at 990-8929 or [email protected].