Clinical and regulatory resources
Protocols, assessment instruments, and reference material for ringside physicians, commission medical staff, officials, and athletic commissions, together with articles, the administrative policies of the Alabama Athletic Commission, and news and information on fight science.
Featured article · Critical review · 2026
A Critical Review of Neidecker, John, and Wheelock (2025) on Ringside Physician Stoppage Authority in United States Combat Sports Commissions
Results. The article uses inconsistent denominators and mislabels proportions of jurisdictions as proportions of states. Alabama is misclassified; correcting Alabama alone ties the modal categories at 22. On the full census with statute controlling, physician authority in both sports exists in 20 jurisdictions, the referee alone in 20, a sport-dependent allocation in 6, and the text is indeterminate in 1. Direct authority in both sports, claimed for 23 jurisdictions, is supportable in 11. Between 13 and 19 of the 47 cells are misclassified against current text. The primary classification and verification review agreed on 46 of 48 jurisdictions (kappa 0.93).
Conclusion. The article’s principal finding does not survive verification against primary legal sources. Its dataset, map, and claimed shift are unreliable as a basis for policy. The fighter-safety analysis also challenges the assumption that independent physician stoppage authority improves protection, because making the cageside examination dispositive increases the incentive to conceal or manipulate information on which the examination depends.
Articles
Registered, citable works in the Combat Sports Regulation and Science series. Latest: Standardized Post-Bout Ringside Concussion Screening in Combat Sports (DOI 10.67999/csx.003; preprint) and Who Stops the Fight? (DOI 10.67999/csx.001).
Administrative policies
The 10 rule chapters of Title 165 and the 21 sections of the enabling statute, each with a DOI record, an abstract, and the official PDF.
News and information
Research, rule changes, and reporting on combat sports medicine and regulation, linked to primary sources.
Alabama Athletic Commission
The Commission's contact details, its administrative policies (Alabama Administrative Code, Title 165) with DOIs, and links to the official rule compilation.
Material in this area addresses medical decisions made within a limited operational window at cageside or ringside, including settings where immediate diagnostic imaging may not be available. Topics include acute head-injury assessment and stoppage criteria, weight management and rehydration, pre-bout medical clearance, suspension and return-to-competition standards, corner responsibilities, and enforceable medical rules for regulatory bodies.
Each published protocol or instrument includes version, identifiers, adoption status, citation, and terms of use. Validation status is stated, including when validation remains incomplete.
The RACE1 Ringside Acute Concussion Examination (edition 4), a post-bout screen for suspected concussion, is described with its evidence review in CSX-003 (preprint; not validated); the complete card deck is issued separately as Supplementary File S7 (DOI 10.67999/csx.003.s7). The RACE1 cards are intended to give the ringside clinician structured guidance after the bout. They do not supersede the authority, clinical judgment or decisions of the ringside physician or any other licensed ringside clinician, and they do not replace the rules or medical requirements of the governing body.
Decision aids are intended for qualified clinicians operating under a commission's medical authority. They do not replace the judgment of the physician of record, the governing regulatory standard, or the medical protocol in force at an event.
Athletic commissions, sanctioning bodies, and event medical directors may request licensing and implementation information from editor@searspublishing.net.
Protocols and instruments are versioned. Superseded records remain available and identify the successor so that historical decisions can be evaluated against the version in force at the time.
Proposals from ringside physicians, commission medical directors, and combat sports researchers are welcome. See For authors.
