'Needs to be stopped' Doctor speaks out against Dana White's Power Slap

Dana White's Power Slap has once again caught wind in the medical community.

The slapping contest is being scrutinized for 'accelerating' the 'worst parts' of combat sports, putting contestants in a position where they're not just defenseless, but required to sustain traumatic brain injury to compete.

Calling for somebody to 'speak out' against the contest is influencer doctor-turned-boxer Doctor Mike, a.k.a Dr. Mike Varshavski.

Medical Experts Raise Red Flags Over Dana White's Power Slap — Power Slap

Doctor Mike: 'Someone needs to come out and speak out against Power Slap'

Speaking with Ariel Helwani, Dr. Mike didn't mince his words dismissing the legitimacy of Power Slap.

"Someone needs to come out and speak out against [Power Slap]... It needs to be stopped.

"To me it takes the worst part about combat sports and accelerates it. Like, why is boxing problematic? Repeat blows to the head if someone's not protecting themselves. And here, the whole point is to not protect yourself and take blows.

"It's literally taking the unhealthiest aspect and removing the healthiest aspect, which is all the cardio, the training that's required to box."

"Someone needs to come out and speak out against [Power Slap]... It needs to be stopped.

It takes the worst part about combat sports and accelerates it. Why is boxing problematic? Repeat blows to the head if someone's not protecting themselves. And here, the whole point is to… pic.twitter.com/GMF4KyePoh
— Ariel Helwani (@arielhelwani) July 30, 2025

Medical experts slam Power Slap

Many medical experts share Dr. Mike's sentiment. Neurosurgeons from the University of Pittsburgh found that 78.6 percent of Power Slap participants showed signs of second impact syndrome.

Speaking to MMA Knockout, the doctors behind the study, Dr Nitin Agarwal, M.D., and Dr Raj Lavadi, M.D., discussed their findings further.

"when I look into it, I was horrified because we're promoting actually just slapping each other without any self defense," Dr Agarwal remarked. "I thought, horrified, comical.

"... I'm really glad that Raj encouraged us to study this further so we can actually quantify the risks, of well, what does it mean when you get slapped and how much does it actually affect you? And obviously nobody wants to be slapped, but what are the invisible risks?

"[...] I wanna not even just highlight the second impacts from repetitive injury. But after somebody gets slapped and slams their head on the stand, that alone is just a shocking factor and concerns me.

"... If you get hit, you got 60 seconds to recover and get back up so you can get hit again. Forget about the second impact syndrome. We're looking at a third, fourth, fifth. How many repetitive hits before we get some attention to make this safer? And quite frankly, I'm not even sure you can make it safer."

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