NGA/Hooters Tour Goes Green for Lyme Disease Awareness

 

Players, Staff to show support in Hawkinsville, Ga.

Myrtle Beach, S.C. – Earlier this season, the NGA/Hooters Tour showed its support for the Susan G. Komen Foundation by going “Pink” on during the second round of several tournaments.

This week, the Tour will lend its support to different cause and a sport a different color.

During the second round of the ComSouth Classic at Southern Hills Golf Club in Hawkinsville, Ga., NGA/Hooters Tour players and officials will be wearing lime green for Lyme Disease Awareness.

Lyme disease is the fastest growing infectious disease in the United States. In 2007, 27,244 cases of Lyme disease were reported to the Center for Disease Control (CDC). However, Lyme disease is also one of the most misunderstood diseases.

“The worst thing is being misdiagnosed,” said current NGA/Hooters Tour member Billy Shida, who was diagnosed with the disease in 2008. “If the  disease is caught in the early stages, it’s treatable. But there are a lot of people out there that don’t even know they have it. I don’t know when I got it, but I do know when it was diagnosed.”

After being diagnosed with Lyme disease in 2008, Shida learned it had progressed into chronic Lyme disease in 2009. While there is no known cure for chronic Lyme disease at the moment, Shida, through treatment, has seen the debilitating effects of the disease – headaches, fatigue, back pain, achy joints – subside.

Shida, a rookie on the NGA/Hooters Tour, managed to play through the pain during his collegiate career at Georgia College and earned the inaugural David Toms Award in 2010, an honor created by the Golf Coaches Association of America and the David Toms Foundation to be given annually to a men’s collegiate golfer who has overcome adversity to achieve collegiate excellence.

Like Toms, a former NGA/Hooters Tour winner, Shida hopes to climb the golfing ladder. So far in 2011, Shida has made five of nine cuts as a professional on the NGA/Hooters Tour coming into the ComSouth Classic.

“I won the award because of what happened to me, but I don’t tell a lot of people about having the disease,” said Shida. “I don’t want people to think I’m looking for sympathy, because I’m not. But if I’m recognized for it and get to help some people know more about it, that’s fine. I think it’s great that the NGA/Hooters Tour is helping out to spread awareness. There is a lot more awareness in the Northeast. Hopefully, this will bring more awareness to the South.”