THE Olympic Creed implies that the most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered, but to have fought well.

The Olympic Movement strives no less than to promote a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity. The Olympic spirit requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play. It reaches its peak with the bringing together of the world’s athletes at the great sports festival, the Olympic Games, which will be held this summer in London.

Olympic athletes must be citizens of the country they represent. Dual nationals may compete for either country, as long as three years have passed between when the competitor competed for his former country.

Before American doctors can be considered for the title of United States Olympic committee physician, they must have five years experience providing medical care for an athletic team at the high school, collegiate, or professional level in the United States.

U.S. Olympic physicians, like U.S. athletes, are chosen from their American peers and must provide meaningful service to the U.S. Olympic effort before they can be chosen to go to the Olympic Games in London. U.S. physicians are chosen after they have volunteered their service at national and international sporting events like the World University Games or the Pan-American Games.

About half of the illnesses that Olympic doctors see are travel-related such as colds, asthma, travelers' diarrhea, urinary tract infections, and rashes. Planning for these types of ailments is part of the job, along with making sure they have all the appropriate medical supplies and medications. Olympic doctors will also deal with dehydration and nutritional issues and be asked to supervise the athletes during random drug testing.

Those sports-related injuries seen most often in the Olympics tend usually to be related to over-use. The injuries will frequently be tendonitis or joint sprains and some low back pain. About half of the swimming injuries are musculoskeletal – mostly shoulder and knee pain.

Over the past 20 years, Guam chiropractors, physical therapists and medical doctors have all volunteered their time and resources to support local sports and fitness activities. Orthopedic surgeon Dr. Jan Bollinger, hand surgeon Jerone Landstrom, and family physician Tom Rozyski have all been medically involved with Guam's elite athletes over the past two decades.

Guam Medical Association President Dr. Tom Shieh administers a prestigious sport-scholarship award to celebrate student athletes in the local high schools.

The recently deceased Dr. Patrick Sagisi was one the foremost supporters of local sports medicine and for many years coordinated Guam's Olympic medical team.

This summer, a sports medicine specialist from the Asian country of the Philippines has been chosen over Guam's local doctors to attend to our island's elite athletes at the 2012 Olympics in London. Manila surgeon Jose Raul Canlas has controversially been selected to represent Guam. According to GNOC head Rick Blas, he didn’t think any of the Guam doctors wanted to go to the Olympics this year.