Disability football: sports injury epidemiology, injury prevention review, attitudes to concussion guidelines and concussion guideline synthesis.

BACKGROUND

Fifteen percent of the world’s population live with disability, and many of these individuals choose to play sport. There are barriers to sport participation for athletes with disability and sports injury can greatly impact on daily life, which makes sports injury prevention additionally important.

OBJECTIVES

The purpose of this project is to review the definitions, methodologies and injury rates in disability sport, which should assist future identification of risk factors and development of injury prevention strategies. A specific focus lies on concussions in disability sports. A secondary aim is to highlight the most pressing issues for improvement of the quality of injury epidemiology research for disability sport.

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Providing guidance to concussion management in para-athletes
Providing guidance to concussion management in para-athletes

Concussion is a frequent injury in many sports and is also common in para athletes. However, there is a paucity of concussion research related to para sport, and prior International Concussion in Sport (CIS) consensus papers have not substantively addressed this population.

Concussion consensus guidelines should recognise the growing number of athletes living with disability
Concussion consensus guidelines should recognise the growing number of athletes living with disability

Significant differences exist between SCAT3 baseline section scores for footballers with and without disability. Consequently, concussion consensus guidelines should recognise these differences and produce guidelines that are specific for the growing number of athletes living with disability. 

An urgent need for consensus on sports injury definition and methodology in disability sports
An urgent need for consensus on sports injury definition and methodology in disability sports

Fifteen percent of the world’s population live with disability, and many of these individuals choose to play sport. There are barriers to sport participation for athletes with disability and sports injury can greatly impact on daily life, which makes sports injury prevention additionally important. The purpose of this review was to systematically review the definitions, methodologies and injury rates in disability sport, which should assist future identification of risk factors and development of injury prevention strategies.