Safety

Most injuries in youth basketball are minor and can be treated with simple first-aid. Finger sprains are common, but ankle and knee injuries, especially in Grades 1 through 6, are not. Here's some basic first aid advice from a longtime coach.

Girls who play sports more than 8 hours per week are twice as likely as their less active peers to suffer a stress fracture, a new study finds. Most at risk were those engaged in three activities (running, basketball and cheerleading/gymnastics) which involve repeated jumping and landing which place particuarly high stress on bone, with the risk of injury increasing about 8 percent for each extra hour of activity over four per week.

Concussion rates in thirteen high school sports from 1998 to 2008, as reported in three separate studies, vary widely by sport and, in some cases, by gender.

Skin infections in athletes, including community-associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (CA-MRSA), are extremely common.  The nature of athletics, which expose the skin to a wide variety of stresses, trauma, environmental factors, and infectious agents, all combine to continually attack the integrity of the skin and lead to considerable disruption to individual and team activities.  A new position statement by the National Athletic Trainers' Association, says that recognition of skin diseases is absolutely essential, particularly by certified athletic trainers, who "represent the first line of defense against spread of infections to other team members."

Among the high school basketball rule changes recently approved for the 2010-11 season by the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS)  are those promoting good sportsmanship.

Following a specially-designed warm-up regimen before sports measurably improves muscle strength and flexibility and corrects biomechanical imbalances blamed for the epidemic of anterior cruciate injuries among female athletes, says a new study of high school basketball players published in the American Journal of Sports Medicine.                                                           

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Which high school sports pose the highest risk of severe injury?  Football leads the list, slightly more than wrestling and more than twice the rate in girls' basketball and girls' soccer.  The safest of the nine studied? Girls volleyball.