The Risks of Youth Injury in Soccer, According to the American Academy of Pediatrics
This content was originally authored by Katie Taylor in the 11/7/19 edition of our Weekly Concussion Update newsletter.
A clinical report in Pediatrics by Andrew Watson et al., generated by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Council on Sports Medicine and Fitness, discusses risk factors and prevention tactics for youth injuries in soccer. While the AAP maintains that soccer is a beneficial component in the lives of most athletes, it also warns readers that the risk of injury in the sport is increasing. The authors refer to a recent retrospective study on children aged 7–17 years old who visited the emergency department for soccer-related injuries between 1990 and 2014. Researchers Smith et al. found that in this time frame, the annual number of soccer-related injuries increased 111%, and the rate of concussions relative to playing time increased by almost 1600%. There is insufficient data to determine whether this trend is indicative of higher rates of head injuries or better concussion reporting practices.
Nonetheless, the AAP offers several concrete steps to decrease head injuries. Although heading the ball is the activity most associated with concussion, the mechanism of most soccer injuries is contact with other players, instead of head contact with the ball. Emphasizing fair-play rules, enforcing regulations, using age-appropriate balls, and teaching proper heading techniques, could help decrease concussion and injury risks. The clinical report also discusses orthopedic injuries, especially ACL tears and specific steps that coaches can take to prevent these. While the study uses injury rate in calculating the increasing amount over the time period, the repeated references to the actual number of injuries in reporting the injury increase may be slightly misleading. The number of participants in youth soccer has increased by around 90% since 1990, so the study may not be fully accounting for the dramatic denominator change.