A 2-Year Prospective Study of Injury Epidemiology in Elite Australian Rugby Sevens: Exploration of Incidence Rates, Severity, Injury Type, and Subsequent Injury in Men and Women

Abstract

A 2-year prospective study of injury epidemiology in elite A 2-year prospective study of injury epidemiology in elite Australian rugby sevens: Exploration of incidence rates, severity, Australian rugby sevens: Exploration of incidence rates, severity, injury type, and subsequent injury in men and women injury type, and subsequent injury in men and women A 2-year prospective study of injury epidemiology in elite Australian rugby sevens: Exploration of incidence rates, severity, injury type, and subsequent injury in men and women.A two-year prospective study of injury epidemiology in elite Australian rugby sevens: exploration of 1 incidence rates, severity, injury type and subsequent injury in men and women 2 2 ABSTRACT 1 Background: Injuries are common in rugby sevens but studies to date have been limited to short, non-2 continuous time periods, and reporting of match injuries only. 3Purpose: To report the injury incidence rate (IIR), severity and burden of injuries sustained by men and women 4 in the Australian rugby sevens program; and to provide the first longitudinal investigation of subsequent injury 5 occurrence in rugby sevens, looking beyond tournament-injuries only. 6 Study design: Descriptive longitudinal epidemiology study.7Methods: 90 international rugby sevens players (55 men and 35 women) were prospectively followed over two 8 consecutive seasons (2015-16 and 2016-2017). All medical attention injuries were reported irrespective of time-9 loss. Individual exposure, in terms of minutes, distance and high speed distance, was captured for each player 10 for matches and on-field training using global positioning system (GPS) devices. The IIR and injury burden (IIR 11x days lost to injury) were calculated per 1000 player hours, and descriptive analyses performed. 12Results: 73 players (81.1%) sustained 365 injuries at an IIR of 43.2 per 1000 player hours (95%CI 38.8-47.8). 13Female players experienced a lower but non-significant IIR compared to male players (incidence rate ratio 14 (IRR)=0.91, 95%CI=0.73 to 1.12). Female players sustained a higher proportion of injuries to the trunk region 15 (relative risk (RR)=1.75, 95%CI=1.28 to 2.40) but a lower number to the head/neck region (RR=0.58, 1695%CI=0.37 to 0.93, p=0.011) compared to male players. The majority (80.7%) of subsequent injuries were of a 17 different site and different nature to previous injuries. A trend towards a reduced number of days, participation 18 time, distance and high speed distance completed prior to the next injury was observed following successive 19 injury occurrence. 20Conclusions: A trend for a lower IIR was observed for female players compared to male players, with variation 21 of injury profiles observed between sexes. Subsequent injuries account for the majority of injuries sustained in 22 rugby sevens, and are typically different to previous types of injuries that have been sustained. Following each 23 successive injury, the risk profile for future injury occurrence appears to be altered, which warrants further 24 investigat...

Musculoskeletal injuries in athletes from five modalities: a cross-sectional study

“…Rugby involves a high volume of running and cutting and turning movements with high speed. It also involves serious direct trauma causing severe joint injuries in the ankle, shoulder and knee muscles or tendons [19,23]. Due to this, in the present study, we observed a high frequency of injury in the ankles and shoulders of rugby athletes.…”

“…In addition, 65% of first division soccer athletes showed some MSK-I type during the season [17], and 58% of university athletes from fifteen different sports had at least one injury at the end of the sports season [18]. The accumulation of MSK-I makes athletes less tolerant of hard training and therefore less likely to achieve higher goals, in addition to the serious problems they present for sports medical teams [19]. MSK-Is also generate high economic costs due to performance loss and diagnosis and treatment of the injuries, affecting the athlete and the sports team [20].…”

United States Under-19 Rugby-7s: Incidence and Nature of Match Injuries During a 5-year Epidemiological Study

“…These injury proportions were lower than head and neck injury incidences reported in a previous U.S. community Rugby-7s cohort (31.3%) [2]. When considered in totality, both U.S. studies have reported higher proportions of head and neck injuries with Rugby-7s than reported numbers in international elite Rugby-s (4.9-23.2%) [6,8,34] as compared to Olympic players (12.5-14.3%) [6]. These findings may reflect limited training, developing tackling techniques, or lack of understanding of injury preventive biomechanics involved in U.S. Rugby-7 athletes of all ages, compared to international rugby players.…”

“…These lower extremity rates were higher than a similar aged international U18 Rugby-15s (14%) [29] but lower than more competitive international U20 Rugby-15s players (47.3-50.6%) [27,28]. Meanwhile, previous literature on U.S. community Rugby-7s noted lower rates (14.6%) [2] among lower extremity injuries than in elite Rugby-7s (47.1-56.3%) [6,34] and Olympians (50-62.5%) [6].…”

“…Comparing literature, the proportion of time-loss upper extremity injuries was higher in the current study (both sexes 31.9%, 41 days; males 31.4%, 47 days; females 33.3%, 25 days) than international populations, among adolescent boys Rugby-15s (academy 28.4%, 31 days; school 24.4% 52 days) and U18 Rugby-15s (14%; 9.33 days) [ 20 , 29 ], but lower than competitive international U20 Rugby-15s players (27.1–28.2%) [ 27 , 28 ]. Elite Rugby-7s players, National players and Olympians respectively, note upper extremity injuries to range between 17.8–28.8% and 25–35.7% [ 6 , 34 ]. The U19 cohort was similar to U.S. Rugby-7s community player injury incidences of upper extremities (23.4–33.3%), which could reflect the amateur U.S. populations’ willingness to tackle with preconceived tackling views of other U.S. sports [ 2 , 11 ].…”