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PHILADELPHIA— Penn Medicine is the new official orthopaedic provider for Drexel University Athletics, providing care for the Drexel Dragons. Effective immediately, this partnership ensures that Drexel athletes will receive the highest-level care for any injuries or orthopaedic needs they have on and off the field, court, or mat.
“Drexel Athletics is home to some of the country’s elite athletes who need top-level care to stay at the height of their games,” said Brian Sennett, MD, the chief of Penn Sports Medicine within Penn Orthopaedics. “For that reason, we’re excited to enter into this partnership with our next-door neighbors. Though the Dragons may sometimes be our rivals between the lines, we’re glad that we’ll be playing a role in keeping their athletes healthy and keeping these games, matches, and meets exciting.”
Drexel’s athletic training teams will continue to provide game-day support to its athletes at its athletic headquarters, the Daskalakis Athletic Center (DAC), and elsewhere. However, more serious and longer-term medical care will be provided through Penn Orthopaedics. This could range from physical therapy to full surgical procedures.
“I am thrilled by our new partnership with Penn Orthopedics, a world-class medical provider for orthopedic surgery and services that are only a few blocks from the DAC,” said Drexel University Director of Athletics Eric Zillmer, PhD. “This partnership was made with our student-athletes’ well-being at the forefront. On a personal level, Dr. Brian Sennett, chief of Sports Medicine at Penn, is a good friend of Drexel who we can entrust with the care of all our student-athletes.”
Penn Orthopaedics will be at the lead of care for Drexel’s 18 different teams and 490 athletes. The partnership will last for at least the next two years.
“Any time we enter into a partnership like this, it sends a wave of excitement through our doctors and staff,” said L. Scott Levin, MD, FACS, FAOA, the chair of Orthopaedic Medicine at Penn Medicine. “But to open our practices to even more top-rank Philadelphia athletes, on the heels of our partnership with the Philadelphia Flyers earlier this year, strikes an extra sense of pride in me for our program.”
Penn Medicine is one of the world’s leading academic medical centers, dedicated to the related missions of medical education, biomedical research, excellence in patient care, and community service. The organization consists of the University of Pennsylvania Health System and Penn’s Raymond and Ruth Perelman School of Medicine, founded in 1765 as the nation’s first medical school.
The Perelman School of Medicine is consistently among the nation's top recipients of funding from the National Institutes of Health, with $550 million awarded in the 2022 fiscal year. Home to a proud history of “firsts” in medicine, Penn Medicine teams have pioneered discoveries and innovations that have shaped modern medicine, including recent breakthroughs such as CAR T cell therapy for cancer and the mRNA technology used in COVID-19 vaccines.
The University of Pennsylvania Health System’s patient care facilities stretch from the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania to the New Jersey shore. These include the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, Chester County Hospital, Lancaster General Health, Penn Medicine Princeton Health, and Pennsylvania Hospital—the nation’s first hospital, founded in 1751. Additional facilities and enterprises include Good Shepherd Penn Partners, Penn Medicine at Home, Lancaster Behavioral Health Hospital, and Princeton House Behavioral Health, among others.
Penn Medicine is an $11.1 billion enterprise powered by more than 49,000 talented faculty and staff.