3 Common Winter Sports Injuries and How to Avoid Them
“Hold my coffee.” Don’t let these be your famous last words before getting injured. Winter sports are amazing to watch; skiers and snowboarders traveling at high velocities and defying gravity when launching off jumps the size of houses. Figure skaters effortlessly glide, edge, and spin. All activities have risks, but the variables involved in winter sports can be out of our control, unfamiliar, and have higher stakes than what we are used to. This blog will cover tips, strategies, and more to keep you on the slopes and rink and out of the emergency room this winter.
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Why Are ACL Tears So Common? 4 Ways to Help Minimize Your Risk of Injury
Anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears, the dreaded injury. Many people know ACL tears are a severe injury, involving a long road of recovery despite surgical or conservative intervention. The ACL is a sturdy ligament deep in the knee joint that stabilizes the knee, specifically with rotational movements. There are two ways to injure your ACL, direct contact or non-contact. A direct contact ACL injury is when the knee takes a direct blow from another person or object. A non-contact ACL injury occurs when pivoting, cutting, twisting, or landing on the knee.
MCL vs. ACL: What’s the Difference?
When talking with a healthcare provider, medical jargon can quickly become alphabet soup. The knee, for example, houses the anterior cruciate ligament, posterior cruciate ligament, medial collateral ligament and lateral collateral ligament. The ACL, PCL, MCL and LCL respectively. Huh? What do those words and acronyms even mean? What do these structures do for the knee anyway? In the absence of an explanation, this jargon can become confusing or overwhelming for patients. Let’s take a deeper look at two of the major ligaments in the knee and make some sense of the alphabet soup, shall we?
6 Exercises to Help Minimize an Injury to the ACL
With ACL injuries on the rise in young athletes, it is as important as ever to improve the strength in the lower limbs as a means to prevent an ACL tear.1 The average time of recovery after an ACL tear and subsequent surgery is typically six to nine months, and can set back an athlete for a much longer period of time than that.2 Biomechanics and strength are just a few pieces of the puzzle that can help prevent an injury. Proper rest, recovery, sleep, and nutrition can also help minimize the risk of an ACL tear from happening. The following are a list of strengthening exercises that address important aspects of an ACL prevention program.
How to Reduce Your Risk of ACL Injuries
Co-author: Dylan Webster, SPT, XPS
If you have been following sports over the past few years you may have noticed there has been an increase in anterior cruciate ligament or ACL tears in both men’s and women’s sports. You may be asking yourself if there is anything they can be doing to reduce their risk of a knee injury especially if you have young athletes in your home participating in sports such as football, soccer and basketball. Is it even possible to reduce your risk of a knee injury in general? Luckily the answer is…absolutely!
Minimizing the Risk of ACL Injuries in Athletes
One of the most feared injuries in all of sports is injury to the Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL), yet this continues to be among the most common injuries in active individuals. Even as the latest evidence in injury prevention has decreased the prevalence of some other injuries, ACL tears have continued to be an issue over the years. Many of our friends, family members, and/or favorite athletes have suffered from ACL tears. Thus there have been several studies conducted to get to the core of what actually causes the ACL to tear.
The Risk of ACL Injuries in Baseball
Anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries are typically associated with sports like soccer or football, however these injuries can occur in any sport – including baseball.
ACL Injury Prevention in Female Athletes
If you have played sports for any length of time, you more than likely know of someone who has had an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury, or have experienced one yourself. Statistically, females have a 4-6 times greater likelihood of an ACL injury than males participating in the same sport.1 These injuries can significantly contribute to the overall cost of healthcare in the US, with data showing that ACL injury costs are approaching $1 billion to $3 billion a year in treatment and management.2
