A Look at the Creation of Colorado’s —First Female Athlete Program

By Kara Mason

The Female Athlete Program at Children’s Hospital Colorado fills a unique need: specialized care for young female athletes who need nutrition guidance, menstrual health expertise, and help with sports performance or injury-related care.

While the program has been formally operating for just more than eight months, the program’s medical director and sports medicine physician Aubrey Armento, MD, assistant professor of orthopedics at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, says it’s something that has been top of mind for her for a long time.

“I still consider myself an athlete,” she says. “I’m still a competitive runner. I run marathons and trail ultras, and I’ve been running since I was in high school. I struggled with irregular periods, disordered eating, and bone injuries when I was younger, so a lot of my passion for doing this work just comes from personal experience and struggling with the same things I see a lot of my young athletes in clinic struggling with.”

The program commonly treats patients with the female athlete triad, the interconnection of low energy availability — a mismatch in energy intake through food and energy burned with exercise — menstrual dysfunction, and low bone mineral density.

Low energy availability also leads to a condition called relative energy deficiency in sport (REDs), which comprises multiple negative effects on the body, including bone and menstrual health, as well as sports performance impairments. A multidisciplinary team offers comprehensive care that meets the need of the individual athlete and their treatment plan for these conditions.

Athletes have access to an athletic trainer, a sports medicine physician, a sports dietitian, and a pediatric and adolescent gynecologist to ensure holistic care.

“Having all of the pieces is critical to a young athlete’s care, so it was important to bring them altogether into one program,” Armento says.

We sat down with Armento to talk about how the program came to fruition and what it means for female athletes across Colorado.