Hot off the press comes this publication by our own Caroline Bolling. Proud to say her qualitative work has created waves and found its way to the British Journal of Sports Medici e. This particular study explored how sports injury prevention takes place in elite sport practice and to describe the perspectives of athletes, coaches and physiotherapists regarding the most critical factors that help prevent injury in the elite sports context.
This qualitative study employed semistructured interviews in 19 international level athletes, coaches and physiotherapists, from different Olympic sports. Interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed using comparative data analysis based on Grounded Theory.
The participants perceived injury risk as an inherent part of elite sports, because athletes try to enhance performance by pushing their limits. Participants described injury prevention as a learning process that changed over time, based on their sports experience and the injuries that they had sustained along their career. Communication among the athletes, coaches and physiotherapists was described as a key component of the injury prevention process. Study participants emphasised the relevance of teamwork and shared responsibility. Performance was presented as the core of the athlete’s daily practice, indicating that injury prevention can be a means to that end but is not a goal in itself for this community.
The study concluded that participants perceive injury prevention as part of elite sports and thus embrace the need for injury prevention. Injury prevention strategies in elite sports were described as a learning process, following the dynamic nature of training for maximal performance. Performance is the participants’ main goal.
The full manuscript can be accessed here (paid access)
Bolling C, Delfino Barboza S, van Mechelen W, et al. Letting the cat out of the bag: athletes, coaches and physiotherapists share their perspectives on injury prevention in elite sports. British Journal of Sports Medicine Published Online First: 09 August 2019. doi: 10.1136/bjsports-2019-100773