Retrospective Injury Epidemiology of One Hundred One Competitive Oceania Power Lifters: The Effects of Age, Body Mass, Competitive Standard, and Gender

Abstract

The injury epidemiology of competitive power lifters was investigated to provide a basis for injury prevention initiatives in power lifting. Self-reported retrospective injury data for 1 year and selected biographical and training information were obtained via a 4-page injury survey from 82 men and 19 women of varying ages (Open and Masters), body masses (lightweight and heavyweight), and competitive standards (national and international). Injury was defined as any physical damage to the body that caused the lifter to miss or modify one or more training sessions or miss a competition. A total of 118 injuries, which equated to 1.2 +/- 1.1 injuries per lifter per year and 4.4 +/- 4.8 injuries per 1,000 hours of training, were reported. The most commonly injured body regions were the shoulder (36%), lower back (24%), elbow (11%), and knee (9%). More injuries appeared to be of a sudden (acute) (59%) rather than gradual (chronic) nature (41%). National competitors had a significantly greater rate of injury (5.8 +/- 4.9 per 1,000 hours) than international competitors (3.6 +/- 3.6 per 1,000 hours). The relative proportion of injuries at some body regions varied significantly as a function of competitive standard and gender. No significant differences in injury profile were seen between Open and Masters or between lightweight and heavyweight lifters. Power lifting appears to have a moderately low risk of injury, regardless of the lifter's age, body mass, competitive standard, or gender, compared with other sports. Future research should utilize a prospective cohort or case-controlled design to examine the effect of a range of other intrinsic and extrinsic factors on injury epidemiology and to assess the effects of various intervention strategies.

The Epidemiology of Injuries Across the Weight-Training Sports

“…Specifically, several studies categorized (at least some of) their data by sex [20][21][22][23][24], competitive standard [20,23,25,26], age [20,26] and bodyweight class [20,26].…”

“…Five of the 20 studies had a score ≥75% and were considered to have a low ROB [19]. The definition of injury was clearly described in 14 studies [13,20,22,[24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34], with these definitions typically requiring an injury to involve physical damage to the athlete that caused the athlete to modify or cancel at least one training session. A summary of the definitions provided in these papers is provided in Table 2.…”

“…for prospective studies at least a 6-month follow up, for retrospective studies up to a 12 month recall period). One study used different modes of data collection [20] (e-mail, telephone, interview, etc.). A diagnosis of all injuries was conducted by health professionals in five studies [22,24,[27][28][29] and partially in another five studies [13,20,21,26,31].…”

“…Three studies also specifically recorded injuries that did not occur as a direct result of weight training [20,27,38]. Keogh et al [20] observed that 13% and 15% of the injuries reported by a group of 101 powerlifters resulted from cross-training (e.g.…”

“…Keogh et al [20] observed that 13% and 15% of the injuries reported by a group of 101 powerlifters resulted from cross-training (e.g. ball sports or cardiovascular training) or were of unknown origin, respectively.…”