Compared to the Canadian Pro Rodeo Sport Medicine Program, the United States has the Justin Healer Program. Though each country treats each other's athletes' injuries during competitions, their approaches are different. The Justin Healer Program has no chiropractic care or massage therapists administering their specialized techniques to the cowboy, as they are required to seek out their own. Instead, they have Registered Physical Therapists (RPT's or LPT's), physiotherapists and certified athletic trainers. Their staff consists mainly of certified athletic trainers backed up by medical staff. Since they have limited resources, they have mostly staff with EMS training. Their logic in having this type of staff is the need for a higher level of treatment, due to the force of injury in rodeo.

The goal of both the Canadian and American sport medicine teams is the same. According to Rick Foster, the program manager for the Justin Sport Medicine Program who sets up clinicians and staffing at different events, all therapists are "valuable." However, the focus of the American therapy program is to give what is most needed at the time of competition to get the athlete back into the field as quickly as possible, which is for the more immediate treatment of injuries.

Certified U.S. trainers use and incorporate all other healthcare approaches, i.e., strengthening, massage, and nutrition. "Moderation" and "maintenance" on a consistent basis are key. Everything has to be controlled and monitored to promote moderation and a speedy recovery so the riders can get back into the competition. The maintenance part of this approach includes a home therapy program where they teach the cowboy how to take care of themselves by giving them preventive and rehabilitative exercises to do. It may not be as good as having a massage therapist, but there is more consistency when there is home training, resulting in a more "empowered" cowboy.

Unfortunately, giving home exercises to cowboys did not prove as effective with the Canadian Team. Wahl explained, "They know what they should do but doing it is another thing. It's like patients that you have in a clinic. You say, 'Now this is a really good idea that you should try this and do it at home to try to maintain it? but they come back and I ask so how'd you do? They say, 'Well, the kids ... and work ... I didn't get a chance to do it.' Since driving from one rodeo to another takes up a lot of their time, exhaustion gives way and they end up sleeping in their vehicles which is not good for necks, backs, and hips."

Considering that the Justin Healer Program has been in existence longer, Kawiecki added, "It covers more rodeos than ours. They have a deeper financial base to work from, but we have a couple of things they don't offer. I'm not saying that our program is any better or any worse. It's just that our program has a larger, multidisciplinary approach to it. Over the last 10 years, it has worked really well."

Regardless of what methods the Canadian or American sport medicine teams use, the goal is the same, to keep the cowboy in the competition by informing, preparing and having specialized therapists administer their therapies. If it makes rodeo a safer sport, is yet to be determined. "I think it may put people at a level to compete which they may not have been at, which essentially makes it safer because you have bucking stock," reflected Kawiecki, "and that's the entertainment of rodeo."