Cleveland Clinic Florida Orthopaedic Surgeon Completes Year as AOSSM President

Board-certified orthopaedic surgeon Kurt P. Spindler, MD, with Cleveland Clinic Florida, just completed his one-year term as the 50th president of the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine (AOSSM). The global sports medicine organization represents over 4,000 orthopaedic surgeons and other professionals who help care for athletes and active people of all ages and levels.

“The AOSSM’s mission is to advance the science and practice of sports medicine through the pillars of research and education, foundational strengths shared by Cleveland Clinic,” says Dr. Spindler.

Leading through teamwork

In explaining the theme of his year as AOSSM president, “All About Teamwork,” Dr. Spindler says, “A team will always outperform the individual. In order to achieve our goals at AOSSM, we must work together to be inclusive and promote diversity.”

That tenet is prominent in the organization’s new five-year strategic plan, which Dr. Spindler helped to create with the AOSSM board. He outlined the plan’s objectives in his address at the AOSSM annual meeting in Colorado Springs last month.

“We need to hardwire diversity, equity and inclusion into the core of our organization,” explains Dr. Spindler. “That will directly impact how we expand AOSSM’s focus to include treating both athletes and active individuals and to be inclusive of all healthcare professionals that care for sports medicine patients.”

Though his term as president ended in July, Dr. Spindler will serve another two years on the AOSSM board as past-president, supporting the organization’s mission and providing context for the current and future presidents.

Advancing sports medicine research

When asked about the organization’s notable achievements in the last year, Dr. Spindler says he is particularly proud of the Sports Medicine Multicenter Research Grant established in honor of AOSSM’s 50th anniversary. “The competitive research grant is the largest in the organization’s history and will be used to support the multicenter Jupiter 4.0 study on risk factors for failure of medial patellofemoral ligament reconstruction,” he adds.

As principal investigator of the game-changing MOON project (Multicenter Orthopaedics Outcomes Network), which made significant contributions to the advancement of care for patients having ACL reconstruction, Dr. Spindler is optimistic this new generation of grant-supported research will lead to further improvements in patient care and the field of sports medicine.

Tracking patient reported outcomes

Research remains a central focus of Dr. Spindler’s career and his role at Cleveland Clinic Florida, where he serves as Director of Clinical Research and Outcomes. He was instrumental in developing Cleveland Clinic’s Outcomes Management and Evaluation (OME) platform, which is used to drive clinical research.

The comprehensive database collects and tracks clinically relevant patient-reported outcomes and quality of life measures in Ohio and Florida. Since 2021, Dr. Spindler has led Cleveland Clinic Florida’s Center of Patient Reported Clinical Outcomes and expanded the platform beyond orthopaedics to include other clinical areas.

“We’ve incorporated heart and vascular care, cancer care, bariatric surgery, and cerebrovascular disease, among others,” says Dr. Spindler. “Our data collection efforts now extend across all five Cleveland Clinic hospitals in Florida.”

Based at Cleveland Clinic Florida’s campus in Weston, Dr. Spindler’s clinical practice also extends throughout the region. He specializes in sports medicine, knee ligament reconstruction and arthroscopic knee surgery.