Overuse Injuries: Students' Points of View

Injuries occur in every sport, at all levels of the game, in various venues across the world. Whether it is an ACL tear in a soccer player in Real Madrid’s stadium in Spain or an eleven-year-old Pennsylvanian boy breaking his collar bone on a beat-up field behind his school during a football game, unexpected and often devastating injuries occur. Overuse injuries, or those injuries that occur due to overuse of key body parts necessary to perform skills associated with specific sports, are extremely common among today’s athletes. Current notion is that repetitive stress disorder, repetition strain injury, and cumulative trauma disorder are synonyms that are used for an overuse injury. It is important to note that overuse injuries are not caused by a specific injury or accident, but rather by repeated stresses on the body (Difiori, 1999). Due to the prevalence of overuse injuries both in professional sports and recreation activities it is important to increase students’ awareness about this issue. Accordingly, the author proposed an assignment for Penn State students majoring in Kinesiology to explore common mechanisms and elaborate on causes and psychological consequences of overuse injuries in sports and recreational activities. This chapter was elaborated by Penn State University KINES 497 “Psychology of Injury” students aimed at discussing overuse injuries in various sports/recreational activities, including tennis, soccer, baseball, football, lacrosse, running, swimming, water polo, and skiing. In addition, some relevant issues related to overuse injuries, such as gender differences and psychological aspects of the recovery process will be also the topic of discussion in this chapter.