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Original article
Injury trend analysis in the Japan national swim team from 2002 to 2016: effect of the lumbar injury prevention project
  1. Yuiko Matsuura1,2,
  2. Mika Hangai2,3,
  3. Keisuke Koizumi2,
  4. Koji Ueno4,5,
  5. Norimasa Hirai5,6,
  6. Hiroshi Akuzawa1,
  7. Koji Kaneoka1,2
  1. 1Faculty of Sport Sciences, Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan
  2. 2Medical Committee, Japan Swimming Federation, Tokyo, Japan
  3. 3Department of Sports Medicine, Japan Institute of Sports Sciences, Tokyo, Japan
  4. 4College of Sports Sciences, Nihon University, Tokyo, Japan
  5. 5Japan Swimming Federation, Tokyo, Japan
  6. 6Faculty of Law, Toyo University, Tokyo, Japan
  1. Correspondence to Dr Koji Kaneoka; kaneoka{at}waseda.jp

Abstract

Objectives This study aimed to clarify the trends of injury occurrence in the Japan national swim team for 15 years and to evaluate the effectiveness of the lumbar injury prevention project. It also aimed to verify the incidence of swimming-related injuries among swimmers by sex, age and swimming style.

Methods The target group comprised 488 swimmers who participated in the Olympics, Asian Games and Universiade from 2002 to 2016; we compiled data for the total number of injuries in each body part. The lumbar injury prevention project started in 2008 and included two components (deep trunk muscle exercises and evaluation of lumbar disc degeneration using MRI). We analysed the prevalence of lumbar injury before (2002–2008) and after (2009–2016) implementation of the lumbar injury prevention project by χ2 test. We compared age, sex and swim strokes between the injured and non-injured groups by χ2 test and unpaired t-test.

Results The most common injury site was the lower back, followed by the shoulder and knee. The lumbar injury prevalence was significantly lower after implementation of the prevention project (23.5% vs 14.8%; p<0.05). Shoulder injuries were common in backstroke swimmers. The injury rate was significantly higher in female than in male swimmers. The injured group was significantly older than the non-injured group.

Conclusions Lumbar injury prevention intervention might be effective to prevent lower back injury in swimmers. Injury risk factors included female and old age; younger female athletes should prevent the development of injuries as they mature.

  • swimming
  • prevention
  • injury
  • Olympics

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjsem-2019-000615

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors YM: first author, substantial contributions to conception and design, data collection, interpretation of results, drafting and revising the manuscript and final version to be published. KoK: corresponding author, substantial contributions to conception and design, data analysis, interpretation of results, drafting and revising the manuscript and final version to be published. MH, KeK, NH, KU, HA: substantial contributions to data collection, revising the manuscript and approval of final version to be published.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Patient and public involvement statement Not requiered.

    • Patient consent for publication Not required.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Data availability statement No data are available.