Elite visually impaired track and field Paralympic athletes present a pattern of overuse injuries predominantly affecting the lower limbs, particularly the thighs, lower legs, and knees. These injuries are associated with tendinopathies, muscle spasms, and strains. There were no apparent differences in injury characteristics between visual classes or sex.
Most research on sport injuries in disabled athletes uses a cross-disability (physical and sensorial) design and merges different sport modalities in the same study. This procedure creates difficulties in interpreting the results, since different disabilities and modalities may cause different injury conditions. The purpose of this study was to analyze the sports injuries frequency in visually impaired athletes, to identify the site of the injury, its mechanism, and the main injuries that occur to these athletes as well as to verify if the visual class relates to the sports injury frequency. The subjects were male and female visually impaired athletes, members of the Brazilian team of athletics, soccer 5, goalball, judo, and swimming, who played in international competitions between 2004 and 2008. Data was collected using the Brazilian Paralympic Committee and the Brazilian Confederation of Sports for the Blind medical form, which included the following information: name, age, modality, competition, visual classification (B1, B2, B3), injury type, location of injury, and diagnosis. A total of 131 athletes participated in this study: 42 female, 89 male amongst which 61 were B1, 46 B2, and 24 B3. From this total, 102 athletes reported 288 sports injuries; 2.82 injuries per athlete. Female athletes presented more injuries than male athletes; however, this difference did not show statistical significance. Regarding visual classification, B1 athletes got more injuries than B2 athletes, and these more than B3 athletes; statistically significant difference was found only between B1 and B3 group. As one group, athletes presented similar values between accident and overuse injuries. Concerning body segment, lower limbs showed more injuries, followed by upper limbs, spine, head, and trunk. Twenty-one diagnoses were reported, being tendinopathies, contractures, and contusions the most frequent.
Introduction: 5-a-side soccer is a sports modality exclusively for athletes with vision impairment (VI) classified as blind - B1 (Blind 1) by the visual classification process. Type of impairment and high-performance training are factors that contribute to the development of sports injuries. Objective: The purpose of this study was to characterize the prevalence of sports-related injuries in visually disabled athletes of the Brazilian 5-a-side soccer team. Methods: The method was defined as a descriptive, longitudinal, epidemiological study. The sample was composed of ten male athletes, members of the Brazilian 5-a-side soccer team, including two athletes without VI and eight athletes with the B1 visual classification, who participated in competitions in 2014. The questionnaire for the data collection was based on the Sport Injuries Protocol for Paralympic Sports (PLEEP), expressing quantitative data analyzed by descriptive statistics. Results: The results showed that, in 2014, five athletes with VI had seven sports injuries, with a prevalence of 62.5%, clinical incidence of 0.87 injuries per athlete per year, and 1.4 injuries per injured athlete. The main sports injuries were muscle strain (28.6%), groin pull (athletic pubalgia) (28.6%), and shin splints (periostitis) (28.6%). All sports injuries occurred in the lower limbs, affecting legs (71.4%) and hips (28.6%). Overload was the most frequent mechanism (57%), reported after the technical kick movement and linked to the muscle imbalance between dominant and supporting lower limbs, in addition to the postural misalignment typical of people with visual impairments. Conclusions: In summary, the Brazilian 5-a-side soccer athletes presented a pattern of overload injuries resulting from the repetition of the technical kick movement, occurring predominantly in sports competitions. Epidemiological data can contribute to the development of strategies to prevent injuries in this sport. Level of evidence II, Progressive prognostic study.
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