LEXINGTON, KY. — Lexington Clinic is excited to congratulate orthopedic surgeon Ben Kibler, MD, FACSM, for receiving the Community Service Award from the Kentucky Medical Association (KMA). The award recognizes one physician in Kentucky for significant contributions to the community. The KMA selected Dr. Kibler for his longtime dedication and service to athletes.
Kibler practiced orthopedic surgery at Lexington Clinic from 1977 to 2020 and is currently the medical director for the Lexington Clinic Institute for Clinical Outcomes and Research. In addition to authoring more than a dozen books and publishing more than 220 peer-reviewed papers, Kibler has received numerous awards and has served as a guest speaker at medical meetings in dozens of countries on every continent except Antarctica.
In July 2021 he was inducted into the American Orthopedic Society for Sports Medicine’s (AOSSM) Hall of Fame.
A former baseball player himself, Kibler was the driving force behind Lexington Clinic creating its Orthopedics – Sports Medicine center, which has treated countless athletes and other patients’ orthopedic injuries. Among his many other accomplishments at the clinic, Kibler developed the first comprehensive sports medicine program in Kentucky, and performed more than 23,000 surgical procedures.
He was widely acknowledged as a thought leader in shoulder surgery and the role of the scapula, establishing The Shoulder Center of Kentucky. In addition to complex shoulder surgery, Kibler was accomplished in acute knee injury surgery, sports medicine, and arthroscopic surgeries of the knee, ankle and elbow.
Kibler was also a member of the Kentucky Medical Association Committee on the Medical Aspects of Sport. A handful of the policies established by the committee during Dr. Kibler’s time include placing athletic trainers in every high school in Kentucky, determining safety plans for games in severe weather, and creating policies for concussions, including how to recognize them and how to determine when players should be removed and allowed to return to play.
