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  • Q&A with Australian Health Practitioners

    Can you prevent sporting injuries?

    Related Topic
    Sports Injuries & Prevention
    What things can you do to prevent injury, is there anything or anyone I can see that will help?
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    Dr Ryan Hislop

    Chiropractor

    Ryan Hislop is the Clinical Director at the Orange Chiropractic Health and Wellness Centre. As an experienced and evidence-based diagnostician, Ryan works largely by medical … View Profile

    In summary; Yes. For the weekend warrior, the best advice is to stretch, strengthen, go to training, eat well and be physically fit. For the elite athlete, you may have a team to support you, and as the study below suggests, a sports chiropractor may provide additional benefits beyond conventional management.

    Conventional injury prevention has focused on treating local factors (eg. hamstring stretching/strengthenin etc for preventing hamstring injury) which advises that poor flexibility, fatigue, lack of warm up and weaknesses are risk factors for injury. However, a growing body of evidence suggests that prevention may be greater than just improving the local areas. 

    Sporting injuries, particularly at higher levels are mainly prevented through stretching, strengthening and nutrition. These are commonly managed by a multi-disciplinary medical, paramedical and sports science management team.

    In a recent study in the BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders on semi-elite AFL players, Pollard and Hoskins studied the trends of athletes and their injury rates. The study demostrated a trend towards lower limb injury preention with a significant reduction in lower limb muscle strains and weeks missed due to injury through the addition of a sports chiropractic intervention to the the current best practice management. 

    Hoskins & Pollard. The effect of a sports chiropractic manual therapy intervention on the prevention of back pain, hamstring and lower limb injuries in semi-elite Australian Rules footballers: a randomized controlled trial. BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, 2010. 

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  • Kirsty Woods

    Exercise Physiologist

    Hi I’m Kirsty Woods,I would like to use my experience, expertise and passion to help you reach your weight, energy and health goalsI have been … View Profile

    Agreed with the above. Preventing injury is multi factoral and attention should be given to stretching and strengthening, good rest (both sleep and rest days), nutrition, and building up your routine slowly.

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  • Tim Lathlean

    Exercise Physiologist

    A motivated and proactive postgraduate student at Monash University majoring in sports injury surveillance, applied sports psychology and sports science. Tim also works in clinical … View Profile

    Hi, you can certainly take steps to reduce the chance of injury in sport. Recovery is very important to ensure that you receive optimal adaptation in terms of physical capabilities (speed, strength, power, repeated sprint ability etc) without experiencing prolonged fatigue.

    You can view some strategies on how best to recover in the following SportinMind article: http://www.thesportinmind.com/articles/monitoring-of-recovery-strategies-for-elite-athletes/

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