Sports Injuries in Children Tips

Young athletes are often treated as ‘small adults’ when it comes to treating sports-related injuries. though, the fact remnants that children are both anatomically and physiologically dissimilar from adults. Furthermore, the pathogenesis (course of development) of most of these injuries varies dramatically from that of adults.

To treat these injuries, orthopods tend to follow treatment protocols extrapolated from adults. Such practices should be depressed and management protocol specific for treat these injuries should be follow.

Preventing injuries in the first place can reduce the distressing rate of incidence of these injuries. Improving the athlete’s technique, biomechanics, promote use of caring gear, changing rules to protect athletes and prevent abuse by an overzealous coach/parent can go a long way in achieving this.

Incidence of Sports Injuries in kids

Contrary to popular belief, sports injuries in children are not a rare happening by any stretch of imagination1.

• Belechri et. al., studying the incidence of sports injuries in children from 6 European blending countries, reported an twelve-monthly total of neighborhood of a million outpatient visits in 2 of the countries2

• a similar study conduct in Holland report a incidence rate of 10.6 per 100 participants3

• across the Atlantic, a study conducted in the late 1990s reported 7 million Americans receiving medical attention for games related injuries; children connecting the ages of 5-14 (59.3 per 1000 persons) had the highest incidence of injuries4

Age and Gender Bias

delve into suggests that sports instruction injuries tend to occur:

• more often in boys (2-3 times) as compare to girls4;5; this may put it to somebody more competitiveness in youth male sports

• incidence is highest between the age of 5 to 15 years for both boys and girls4;6

• peak incidence for girls is 12 years

• peak incidence for boys is 5 years4. Boyce et. al., however, statement a peak incidence at 14 years for boys5

In contact sports, injuries are supplementary widespread in post-pubertal than in pre-pubertal children suggesting increased levels of intensity in older children4.

High Risk Sports for the juvenile Athlete

immature athletes involved in the following category of sports are more likely to get injured3;7-9:

• team contact sports

• combat sports

• high jumping sports

• indoor sports

Sports that causes most injuries:

In young male athlete2-4:

• Football

• Soccer

• Basketball

• Field Hockey

Young female athlete2;4;10:

• Gymnastics

• Softball

• Volleyball

Other sports identified as hazardous are cycling, horse riding and rugby8. Another interesting fact is that winter sports have more potentiality to cause injuries in children than summer sports instruction.

Severity of sports instruction Injuries in Children

Sports injuries in children tend to be mild in nature and self limiting. Maffulli et. al. have gone to the extent of occupation youth sports ‘totally safe’11. Also, allegedly, most of these can be effectively treated by opening aid given at the venue by a tutor, teacher, or a close relative.

However, some researchers have report the increasing incidence of severe injuries (fractures) requiring hospitalisation2. In a paper published in the American monthly of Sports Medicine, Backx et. al. reported that of all the sports linked injuries in school children, a monstrous one-third were serious enough to require therapeutic attention3.

3-4% of all cases of sports related injuries require hospitalization2;5.

Profile of Sports Injuries in Children

Soft tissue injuries approximating sprains, strains and contusion are more widespread compare to bony injuries3;7.

Lower boundary injuries3 and upper limb injuries5 have be found to crop up more frequently.

Fractures mostly affect the ankle (40%), knee (25%) and lower leg (29%)7-9. Involvement of wrist in fractures as well as squashy tissue injuries due to fall on an extended hand is an additional common occurence5.

Mechanism of Sports Injuries in Children

frequent mechanisms of sports injury in children are4:

• bumping into someone or somebody bumping into you

• fall

• overexertion

Some motivating facts about young athletes’ injuries are:

• immature musculoskeletal system is more often to blame

• tend to differ vastly from those in the adult skeleton

• influence tendons and ligaments are stronger than frame

• sheering, overload and avulsion forces acting at the points of connection of these strong structures with non-fused bones lead to too much buckling or bowing of bones and thus injuries11;12

• can be detrimental to the normal growth process, esp. of long frame leading to life-long side effects11;13;14

• repeated microtrauma is an extra factor identified as being responsible8;15;16

Prevention of Sports Injuries in kids

Preventive strategies designed by reputed researchers in the field of sports medicine are given below.

• pre-season conditioning for the juvenile athletes with gradual increase in skill training suggested by Dollard et. al.17

• injury prevention programs be taught and implement in school curriculum7

• use of protective gear together with helmets, mouth guards, and shin guards in addition to specific training recommended by Flynn et. al.8;18

• civilizing technique, adequate rest for mending and avoiding overtraining recommended by Franklin and Weiss19

• identifying the risk of life-long disability; conniving method to prevent and reduce these risks20

• physical, physiological and psychological immaturity be taken into account when dealing with the young athlete11

• sharing of dependability to promote young athletes’ safety: schools, instructors/coaches, parents and physician be supposed to be held accountable21

Discussion

More and more children these days are participate in competitive sports. With so much pride and money at stake, there has been a drastic upgrading in the level of athletic training, coaching and equipment involved.

Vast improvements have also been made in the area of sports medicine related to young athletes. Researchers have designed and not compulsory protocols to prevent and alleviate sports related injuries in young athletes1;22-25.

Despite all this, the fact remainder that children still keep getting injured at an alarming rate. What’s more worrying is that some of these injuries lead to long term adjustment of bone anatomy and hence life-long deformities.



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