Dr. Elliot Pellman, chairman of the Jets’ medical department, also serves as president of the NFL Physician’s Society and attends every Jet practice.
Those credentials make him as much an expert as there is in the league on football players suffering from heat stroke, which killed Vikings’ tackle Korey Stringer.
“We take it very seriously, because heat exhaustion can strike without warning,” Pellman said. “We emphasize vigilance. The last words from [head trainer] Dave Price at the team meeting the other day was about the importance of hydration, fluids and drinking. Players are made well aware they need to drink and that their thirst mechanism is not barometer of whether they need fluids.
Here are the precautions Pellman said the Jets take:
They place drinking stations all over the practice fields and inside their training facility.
They employ a battery of trainers who observe the players’ every move.
They employ a full-time nurse who’s at the ready with IV and fluids.
Coach Herman Edwards breaks regularly at practice and demands that his players drink water. During those breaks or even when a player comes to the sideline, assistant trainers will squirt water into the players’ mouths.
Medical staff monitor players’ vital signs and their weight before and after practices.
“We have to try to see beyond their behavior,” Pellman said. “People deny in all sorts of walks of life.”