When athletes train or compete, they expose their bodies to relatively high levels of physical stress. If athletes don't prepare themselves properly, these stresses can trigger significant injuries. Stress on the joints and tendons, in particular, can lead to the development of injuries that include sprains, tendinitis, bone bruising and joint dislocation.
Knee Stresses
During athletic activity, your knees bear a large portion of your weight and absorb increased amounts of physical stress. This makes knee injuries the most common form of joint injuries among athletes. Your knees contain tendons, which attach muscles to bone; ligaments, which attach bone to bone; and two types of a cushioning material called cartilage. Serious forms of stress-related knee injury include tearing and other forms of damage to ligaments or cartilage. Relatively minor forms of injury include swelling, tenderness and a form of tendon irritation and degeneration called tendinitis. Athletes who play sports that involve the upper body, such as tennis, can develop tendinitis in other joints, including the wrists, shoulders and elbows.
Achilles Tendon Stresses
Athletes involved in sports such as basketball and football, which regularly require rapid acceleration from a standing position, can also develop tendinitis in the Achilles tendon, which runs between the calf muscles and heel bone. Other stress-related injuries in the Achilles tendon include irritation, stretching and tearing. These injuries, which can develop with little or no warning, also occur in nonprofessional "weekend" athletes, who frequently don't exercise regularly or fail to warm up properly before engaging in activity.
Joint Sprains and Dislocations
The stress of athletics can trigger a joint sprain, in which a ligament is strained, partially torn or completely ruptured. Symptoms of a sprain include pain, joint instability and inability to move the affected joint. Sprains from athletic activity commonly occur in the knee, wrist and ankle joints. You can also dislocate a joint if the stress of physical contact overcomes the holding strength of the joint's supporting structures. Joint dislocations related to athletic stress most typically happen to your hands and shoulders.
Teenage Athletes
Because of the internal stresses related to normal growth and development, teenage athletes can be especially susceptible to injury, MassGeneral Hospital for Children reports. In particular, growth in developing long bones can significantly decrease a teenage athlete's flexibility and increase the risk of injury related to overuse. Specific forms of overuse injuries in teenagers include knee joint disorders called patellofemoral syndrome and Osgood-Schlatter disease; Little League elbow; and a shoulder joint disorder called shoulder impingement syndrome.
Health professionals who specialize in the study and treatment of sports-related body stress are called exercise physiologists. (See References 5) Consult your doctor or an exercise physiologist for more information on this topic.
References
- National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases; Sports Injuries; April 2009
- Princeton University, University Health Services; Athletic Injuries; October 2010
- PubMed Health; Tendinitis; July 2010
- MassGeneral Hospital for Children: Athletic Injuries
- American Society of Exercise Physiologists: General Information
