Background:Early sport specialization is not a requirement for success at the highest levels of competition and is believed to be unhealthy physically and mentally for young athletes. It also discourages unstructured free play, which has many benefits.Purpose:To review the available evidence on early sports specialization and identify areas where scientific data are lacking.Study Design:Think tank, roundtable discussion.Results:The primary outcome of this think tank was that there is no evidence that young children will benefit from early sport specialization in the majority of sports. They are subject to overuse injury and burnout from concentrated activity. Early multisport participation will not deter young athletes from long-term competitive athletic success.Conclusion:Youth advocates, parents, clinicians, and coaches need to work together with the sport governing bodies to ensure healthy environments for play and competition that do not create long-term health issues yet support athletic competition at the highest level desired.

Patients with moderate to large chondral lesions with failed prior cartilage treatments can expect sustained and clinically meaningful improvement in pain and function after autologous chondrocyte implantation. The subsequent surgical procedure rate observed in this study (49% overall; 40% related to autologous chondrocyte implantation) appears higher than generally reported after autologous chondrocyte implantation.

The reliability and responsiveness of the IKDC SKF is comparable with other commonly used patient-reported outcome measures for patients with articular cartilage lesions. The IKDC SKF is a suitable alternative to other commonly used knee-specific instruments for measuring symptoms, daily function, and level of symptom-free sports activity in patients undergoing articular cartilage surgery.

The findings based on the kinematic and kinetic data in this study suggest that the rising incidence of shoulder and elbow injuries in pitchers may not be caused by the curveball mechanics. Further evaluation of adolescent and adult baseball pitchers is warranted to help determine and subsequently reduce the risk of injury.