Preventive health care and injury prevention should be a routine part of life for every dancer and in every dance company. In addition, the use of a standardized preventive health protocol can provide invaluable information that will only benefit all who work in the field of dance. This section provides valuable medical information developed by the Dance/USA Taskforce on Dancer Health, a group of passionate, concerned medical staff from dance companies across the country.

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THE ANNUAL POST-HIRE HEALTH SCREEN

WHAT’S AT STAKE
In addition to helping individual dancers, an annual health screening of professional dancers has enormous potential to provide outcomes that benefit dance companies and the art form in general. Among the benefits are:

• Reducing the Heavy Financial Burden of Injury
  Reducing injury and improving the health of professional dancers is a “win-win” situation for all parties. It permits more funds to go toward salaries, benefits, and artistic productions rather than the spiraling costs of injury care.
  
• Standardization
  Use of a standardized screening protocol by all North American companies, in addition to a standardized system of reporting injury, will provide an invaluable pool of nameless data that can increase our general knowledge of injury and illness in dance.

DOWNLOAD DOCUMENTS (pdf format):
Overview of Annual Post-Hire Health Screen for Professional Dancers
Nutrition Guidelines

Thank you for your interest in dancer welfare and the Dance/USA Taskforce on Dancer Health. For professional companies interested in the Taskforce Screening Tool and the Guidelines for Administering the Screen, please contact directly:

Nancy Kadel, MD
Chair, Dance/USA Taskforce on Dancer Health
or
Heather Southwick, P.T.
Vice-Chair, Dance/USA Taskforce on Dancer Health

ABOUT THE DANCER HEALTH TASKFORCE