Australian football: Injury profile at the community level

doi:10.1016/S1440-2440(02)80036-6

Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport

Volume 5, Issue 2, June 2002, Pages 149-160

https://doi.org/10.1016/S1440-2440(02)80036-6 Get rights and content

Successful injury prevention relies on injury surveillance to establish the extent of the problem, to monitor injury patterns and to evaluate prevention strategies. Despite the popularity of participation in Australian football at the community level, few injury surveillance studies have been published describing the pattern of injuries at this level of participation. In contrast, ongoing injury surveillance at the elite-level is well established. Reliance on injury data from the elite-level of Australian football to guide injury prevention at the community level may not be appropriate due to differences across the levels with respect to exposure, fitness and skill level. Therefore, specific injury surveillance at the community level of Australian football is warranted.

This study describes the epidemiology of community level Australian football injuries. Injury surveillance was undertaken in five amateur Australian football clubs over the 1999 season. The 320 participating players sustained 421 injuries over the season. The overall rate of injury was 27 injuries per 1000 player hours. Injuries were most commonly sustained at the start of the season and during the second quarter of match participation. Hamstring muscle strains were the most common injury sustained, followed by thigh haematomas and lateral ligament sprains of the ankle. The injury surveillance system used in this study was well accepted by the clubs and provides detailed data for the prioritisation of future injury prevention research at the community level of Australian football.

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The time to return to sport from acute hamstring strain injuries is associated with several functional and structural impairments. However, not all previous studies assessed the preinjury level before acute hamstring strain injuries directly. The purpose of this study was to examine the associations of the time to return to performance following acute hamstring strain injuries with deficits in running biomechanics, hamstring function and structure in collegiate sprinters by a prospective study.
Using a prospective cohort design, 72 participants were recruited from a collegiate track and field team. At the preinjury assessment, a 60-m running-specific test, passive straight leg raise test and isometric knee flexion strength test were assessed at the beginning of the competitive season for three consecutive years (2017–2019). Afterwards, postinjury examinations were performed only in sprinters with acute hamstring strain injuries.
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Injury profiles of Australian football players across five, women's and girls' competition levels
2022, Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport
To describe injury profiles of Australian football players and explore trends across five, women's and girls' competition levels.
Prospective cohort study.
Injuries were prospectively recorded by team personnel across one or two seasons of Australian football (2017–18 and/or 2018–19) including five, women's and girls' competition levels (elite senior, non-elite senior, high-level junior, non-elite junior (14–17 years), and non-elite junior (10–13 years)). Injury incidence rates were calculated per 1000 h and injury prevalence calculated for pre-season, early-season, mid-season, and late-season. Descriptive statistics present injury profiles according to activity, body region, pathology, mechanism, and severity.
From the 392 included players, 760 injuries were recorded. Overall injury incidence was 20.9 injuries per 1000 h. Injury prevalence was highest during pre-season (64.1%). Most injuries were to the lower extremity (n = 440; 58.0%). Ligament/joint sprain injuries were common (n = 147, 19.3%). Several injuries resulted from contact mechanisms (n = 314, 61.4%), with many due to contact with another player (n = 131, 52.8%). Injuries resulting in time lost from participation were common (n = 444, 58.9%). Competition level injury trends were observed, with elite senior (125.1 injuries per 1000 h) and high-level junior (116.9 injuries per 1000 h) players having greater match injury incidence compared to their non-elite counterparts (15.5–41.4 injuries per 1000 h).
This study provides preliminary insight into injury profiles of Australian football players in women's and girls' competitions. These findings can drive future injury risk reduction research specific to this population across the developmental pathway.
Concussion incidence and time-loss in Australian football: A systematic review
2020, Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport
Citation Excerpt :
A possible time-loss definition produced incidence from 0.3546 to 0.8037 at the junior community-level; from 0.4944 to 14.7739 at the adult community-level; and from 2.2438 to 17.6349 at the elite-level. In addition, only seven studies41,42,44–46,48,50,54 reported a combined training and match incidence rate, and only two44,54 reported the number of concussions sustained during training (i.e., no concussions occurred). While this may indicate that concussions occur infrequently in AF training sessions, explicit reporting of the concussion location and training hours are required to accurately determine incidence and concussion risk.
Australian football is associated with a risk of concussion. However, despite the extensive and varied nature of literature devoted to this issue, concussion incidence has not been systematically evaluated. To address this, we aimed to conduct a meta-analysis of concussion incidence in Australian football.
Systematic review. Prospero registration number: CRD42017064290.
A systematic search of 14 databases using the terms ‘concussion’, and ‘Australian football’ (and variations) was used to obtain records that reported concussion incidence per 1000 players hours across age, sex, and level-of-play. Data were grouped based on how time-loss was applied to the concussion definition.
Forty-two studies met inclusion criteria. Incidence rates based on a possible time-loss definition per 1000 player hours, ranged from 2.24 to 17.63 at the elite level, and 0.35 to 14.77 at the community/amateur level. Return-to-play details were reported by six studies and only two studies measured head-impacts in real-time. Several limitations were identified with this literature. First, insufficient return-to-play details precluded a meta-analysis of incidence rates. Second, no longitudinal studies across levels-of-play were found. Third, concussion incidence data for junior and female players were notably scarce.
There was limited scope to determine concussion burden (i.e., incidence and severity) and only preliminary data for player exposure to head-impacts. To address these limitations, injury surveillance should capture sufficient information to permit comparisons within and across levels-of-play. This will also help determine the influence of interventions aimed at reducing the frequency and severity of concussive-injuries.
Injuries in community-level Australian football: Results from a club-based injury surveillance system
2015, Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport
Citation Excerpt :
Match injury rates were calculated per 1000 h of matches and the clinical incidence of injury as the number of injuries per player per season.14 Match exposure was estimated from the number of matches per team per season, average game length (100 min) and usual team size (18 players on the field at any point in time).15 Training exposure was not recorded and therefore, training injury rates and overall injury rates were not calculated.
Far fewer injury surveillance systems exist within community sport than elite sport. As a result, most epidemiological data on sports injuries have limited relevance to community-level sporting populations. There is potential for data from community club-based injury surveillance systems to provide a better understanding of community sports injuries. This study aimed to describe the incidence and profile of community-level Australian football injuries reported using a club-based injury surveillance system.
Prospective, epidemiological study.
Sports trainers from five community-level Australian football leagues recorded injury data during two football seasons using the club-based system. An online surveillance tool developed by Sports Medicine Australia (‘Sports Injury Tracker’) was used for data collection. The injury incidence, profile and match injury rate were reported.
Injury data for 1205 players were recorded in season one and for 823 players in season two. There was significant variability in injury incidence across clubs. However, aggregated data were consistent across football seasons, with an average of 0.7 injuries per player per season and 38–39 match injuries per 1000 h match exposure. A large proportion of injuries occurred during matches, involved the lower limb and resulted from contact.
Data from the club-based system provided a profile of injuries consistent with previous studies in community-level Australian football. Moreover, injury incidence was consistent with other studies using similar personnel to record data. However, injury incidence was lower than that reported in studies using player self-report or healthcare professionals and may be an underestimate of true values.
The role of neuromuscular inhibition in hamstring strain injury recurrence
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Citation Excerpt :
Hamstring strains are amongst the most common and problematic injuries in a wide range of sports that involve high speed running. They are the primary injury in Australian football (Gabbe et al., 2002; Orchard and Seward, 2002, 2009, 2010; Seward et al., 1993), soccer (Ekstrand and Gillquist, 1983; Ekstrand et al., 2010; Hawkins et al., 2001; Woods et al., 2002, 2004) and the sprint events in track & field (Drezner et al., 2005; Sugiura et al., 2008; Yeung et al., 2009), while also accounting for a high proportion of lost playing time in cricket (Orchard and James, 2003; Orchard et al., 2002; Stretch, 2003), rugby union (Brooks et al., 2005a,b,c, 2006), Gaelic football (Newell et al., 2006; O’Sullivan et al., 2008), American football (Elliott et al., 2011; Feeley et al., 2008; Meeuwisse et al., 2000) and hurling (Murphy et al., 2010). High rates of injury recurrence are arguably the most troublesome aspect of hamstring strains because recurring injuries often result in substantially more lost playing time than the original insults (Brooks et al., 2006; Ekstrand et al., 2011; Koulouris et al., 2007) and because the hamstrings remain at elevated risk of injury recurrence for longer than other strained muscles (Orchard and Best, 2002).
Hamstring strain injuries are amongst the most common and problematic injuries in a wide range of sports that involve high speed running. The comparatively high rate of hamstring injury recurrence is arguably the most concerning aspect of these injuries. A number of modifiable and nonmodifiable risk factors are proposed to predispose athletes to hamstring strains. Potentially, the persistence of risk factors and the development of maladaptations following injury may explain injury recurrence. Here, the role of neuromuscular inhibition following injury is discussed as a potential mechanism for several maladaptations associated with hamstring re-injury. These maladaptations include eccentric hamstring weakness, selective hamstring atrophy and shifts in the knee flexor torque-joint angle relationship. Current evidence indicates that athletes return to competition after hamstring injury having developed maladaptations that predispose them to further injury. When rehabilitating athletes to return to competition following hamstring strain injury, the role of neuromuscular inhibition in re-injury should be considered.
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Researching FootballAustralian football: Injury profile at the community level

Australian sports injury data dictionary

Injuries presenting to an Australian sports medicine centre: A 12-month study

Clinical Journal of Sport Medicine

The incidence and nature of Australian Rules football injuries

Australian Family Physician

Who chooses to attend a sports medicine clinic and why?

Sport and active recreation injuries in Australia: evidence from emergency department presentations

British Journal of Sports Medicine

The descriptive epidemiology of Australian football injuries presenting to sports medicine clinics

A pilot case-control study to identify injury risk factors in community level Australian football players

Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport

Sporting and recreational injuries in a general practice setting

Australian Family Physician

Researching Football
Australian football: Injury profile at the community level