Understanding and Avoiding Common Sports Injuries
If you play sports, you may enjoy that very much. Perhaps you play professionally, or maybe you’ve made it to the semi-pro level. You might join an amateur sports league and play with a group of enthusiastic amateurs.
You should know about some common injuries that athletes can sustain, though. You can’t ever avoid them entirely, but if you at least know about them, you can take actions that make a severe injury less likely.
Head and Brain Injuries
If you play sports, you should always protect your head if you can. That often means wearing a helmet. Athletes sometimes sustain coup-contrecoup brain injuries. This can happen if you hit your head against something hard. Hockey players who take hard falls and collide with the boards often risk these injuries.
You might also sustain a concussion. This might happen if someone tackles you hard in football or you take a tumble in soccer. In sports like baseball, these injuries don’t happen as much, but they’re still possible. You might go for a fly ball and hit the centerfield wall, hurting your head or jostling your brain.
Other than wearing a helmet, there’s not much you can do to protect yourself from these kinds of injuries. They’re a part of playing sports. However, you can always play flag football instead of tackle football. You can also join a league where you know it’s more relaxed, and the players don’t get intense.
Facial Injuries
Facial injuries can happen if you play sports as well. When they do, they can damage your vision. You can sustain a broken nose or a jaw. You might damage an orbital bone instead.
These injuries might happen if a hockey stick jabs you underneath your helmet guard. In soccer, they can occur if the ball bounces up sharply and hits you in the face. If you’re playing baseball, you might miss a ball in the sun. It can strike your face on the fly. You may miss a sharply hit ball in the infield that bounces up and strikes you.
To avoid these injuries, you can wear a helmet with a facemask if you’re playing hockey or football. If you’re playing a sport like baseball, you can wear sunglasses. They won’t protect your face much, but they make it more likely you won’t lose a ball in the sun.
Lower Body Injuries
Lower body injuries often happen if you play football, hockey, soccer, or basketball. If you’re playing any of those sports, you can strain or sprain part of your leg. Soft tissue injuries happen often. They can sometimes occur even without you making contact with another player.
You can avoid them by staying hydrated. If you drink plenty of water and sports drinks with electrolytes and stretch before each game, pulling or straining a muscle isn’t as likely.
If you play something like football, it’s also possible someone can collide with your knees when they tackle you. If you’re on the offensive line, for instance, and another linebacker blocks an opposing player into you, they might hyperextend your knee or land on it at an awkward angle.
If that happens, you can suffer a torn ACL, MCL, or PCL. These parts of the knee must all function together to keep you upright and mobile. If you tear or otherwise damage any of them, that can end your sports career. You may also need surgery.
Again, there’s not a whole lot you can do to avoid these kinds of injuries if you play a sport like football or rugby. They naturally have moments where large humans collide with a great deal of force. If someone falls on you, and they’re heavy, you can often expect a serious leg injury.
You can play flag or touch football instead of tackle football. You can also avoid games like rugby. If you play, you might enjoy them, but you’re running a risk. You’re in there with many large individuals, and one of them colliding with you the wrong way can easily prove disastrous.
What Can You Do to Make Certain These Injuries Don’t Occur?
You can never be sure of avoiding an injury. You can hurt yourself walking down the street if you step on a broken piece of the sidewalk.
However, you can play noncontact games if you like. You might do something like bowling or tennis. You can still injure yourself, but you won’t see the inherent violence of football or hockey.
