Types of Injury

The highest number of injuries are muscle strains and muscle bruises, also known as contusions, which account for more than 40% of injuries. They are closely followed by sprains to ligaments, which account for 30% of injuries, and then by dislocations, fractures, lacerations and overuse injuries.

We have a range of free advice leaflets and exercise handouts on all the most common rugby injuries, including advice on how to prevent and treat them. You can download the leaflets at the following link rugby info link.

Head Injury

Between 5-25% of rugby injuries are head injuries, of which 44% are concussions. This is a subject we’ll be covering in more detail in a future blog post, as management of this condition is vital to successful recovery and reducing the risk of long-term complications, which can impact a player’s ability to work or perform at school.

Young Players

It is particularly important that injuries to younger players are managed well to prevent the problems from becoming more serious. Injuries in the young athlete can be trivialised, with the athlete being told to ‘toughen up’ and ‘play through the pain’. This is very rarely in the interests of the young player.

It not only leads to delayed injury healing and return to sport, but it can turn an easily-treated injury into one that becomes difficult to treat, and in some cases, it can result in a serious permanent injury that stops the young player from playing altogether.

While young players can sustain all the same injuries that adult players sustain, their age, and therefore immature skeleton, can make them prone to specific injuries that adult players would be less susceptible to.

These injuries usually involve the ends of the bones where the bony development plates are situated. This is a zone of high bone growth activity, where new bone cells are created and old bone cells are destroyed, allowing the bone to grow.

Management & Prevention

It is particularly important to make sure the adults in charge of the young rugby players manage this process responsibly. This means allowing the players to play at their own intensity and pace, encouraging them to start getting in shape a month or so before any team sports are due to begin, emphasising the importance of stretching and flexibility exercises, starting core stability and postural exercises and making sure the young players are not over-played or over-trained. Parents and coaches who demand too much may be putting their children at risk and could compromise a lot of enjoyable sporting years in the future.

If in doubt regarding either your own injuries or those of your children, seek medical advice, from a doctor, osteopath, physiotherapist or chiropractor, who are all highly trained to diagnose what’s wrong. It’s always better to be safe than sorry. You find our contact details here at Remedy Health and book appointments online here.