Injury surveillance in male professional football; is medical staff reporting complete and accurate?

Abstract

Since the 2000 season, an injury surveillance system has been established to monitor injury risk and injury patterns in the Norwegian professional football league. The aim of this study was to assess the accuracy of routine injury registration performed by medical staff in professional football. The team medical staff completed injury registration forms on a monthly basis throughout the 2007 season (January-October). Players were interviewed at the end of the season (October/November) about all injuries that occurred from July through September. Thirteen of fourteen teams, 296 of 310 A-squad players were interviewed. An injury was recorded when a player was unable to take fully part in football training or match the day after injury. A total of 174 injuries were registered, 123 acute injuries and 51 overuse injuries. Of these, 141 were reported by medical staff and 122 by players. Eighty-nine injuries (51%) were registered using both methods, 52 (30%) by medical staff only and 33 (19%) by player interviews only. Prospective injury surveillance by team medical staff in Norwegian male professional football underestimates the incidence of time-loss injuries by at least one-fifth.

Injuries in Professional Male Soccer Players in the Netherlands: A Prospective Cohort Study

“…13,[16][17][18] According to Ekstrand et al, 12 one explanation for the difference might be that toplevel clubs in Europe have more medical support and can provide more personalized rehabilitation for injured players. Furthermore, Bjørneboe et al 6 reported a difference in the league system in Norway and Sweden as compared with that of most European countries. Owing to climatic conditions, the Norwegian and Swedish league seasons run from April to October/November, with a 3-month presea-…”

“…21,22 More injuries are recorded by prospective injurydocumentation systems than with retrospective interviews. 25,26 However, Bjørneboe et al 6 concluded that a prospective injury-documentation system is not always complete. They studied the accuracy of a prospective injury-documentation system, based on medical staff reporting, by comparing its data with retrospective player interviews.…”

“…For example, injury definitions and methods for data collection and recording often differ considerably among studies. 6,7 Investigations that describe injury risk and injury patterns in professional soccer have typically been conducted during tournaments, [8][9][10][11] have involved only teams at the highest European level, 10,12 have covered only part of a season, 13 or were related to only 1 team. 14,15 Limited published research has included data on injuries within 1 national professional male soccer competition and involving multiple teams.…”

Injury Characteristics in the German Professional Male Soccer Leagues After a Shortened Winter Break

“…However, it is likely that minor injuries are commonly underreported. According to Bjørneboe et al, 27 the real injury incidence is likely to be underestimated by at least 20% if the club's medical staff prospectively collects data as suggested in the Fédération Internationale de Football Association injury consensus statement. To minimize such underreporting, we also obtained information from the mass media.…”

Injury surveillance during a national female youth football tournament in kenya

“…Underreporting of injuries has been noted in previous football injury surveillance studies (Bjorneboe et al, 2010;Soligard, 2006), particularly minor injuries or those that did not lead to medical treatment. We therefore believed that registration of injuries in three ways may give a more complete picture of the injury situation.…”