What Causes Specific Sports Injuries

Sports injuries are a common event in sports activities, especially at the professional level. This is because athletes put most parts of their body to work in a rigorous manner, and of course, they will, because they are being paid to do what they do.

Injuries are common to all sports but are more prominent in contact sports and sports that require running or excessive agility. Of all the parts in the body, the specific places sports injury usually affects is the shoulder, knee, and ankle.

We are going to take a look at specific sports injuries that are common to these body parts and their causes.

Shoulder Injuries

The shoulder joint is a ball-and-socket joint and is the most movable joint in the human body making it prone to injuries. A lot of sports, like cricket, require the excessive use of this joint and the structures around it (muscles, tendons, and ligaments) due to the swinging and throwing actions characterized with the sport. Here are examples of shoulder-related sports injuries and their causes

Rotator Cuff Tear

Your rotator cuff is made up of four muscle that comes from your shoulder blade and as they come out toward the outside of your shoulder, they come together to form one big tendon. This then attaches to the ball part of the ball-and-socket joint that makes up your shoulder.  

This shoulder injury occurs as a result of falling on an outstretched hand or as a result of repetitive activities that put the shoulder to work, like swinging and throwing.

SLAP tear

SLAP terminology is used for Superior Labrum Anterior and Posterior and a SLAP tear or lesion is an injury to the labrum. The labrum is a piece of rubbery tissue that attaches to the exterior of the socket part of the shoulders joint. This keeps the ball in place, and since it is a cartilage, it is susceptible to tears.

Just like the rotator cuff tear, this shoulder injury is also caused by repetitive motions like overhead swinging and throws. Lifting heavy weights can also lead to the SLAP tear.

Knee Injuries

The knee is the most used joint in sports and is the most injured joint. In fact, reports show that knee injuries account for 41% of all sports injuries. Below are the types of knee injuries encountered in sports.

ACL tear

The Anterior Cruciate Ligament, ACL for short, runs diagonally and connects your thigh bones to your shin bones.

Most common sports injury is knee injury it occurs when your foot is firmly placed on the ground and a sudden force hits your knee while your leg is straight or lightly twined.

Meniscus tear

One of your knees has two menisci C-shaped pieces of cartilage that act like a cushion among your shinbone and your thigh bone.

A meniscus tear happens when you effectively twist or move your knee, especially when putting the full push around your full weight on it leading to a split meniscus.

Ankle Injuries

The ankle is another area in the body that suffer from sports-related injuries. And although not as common as the knee injury, ankle injuries are the number one reason athletes miss out on games.

Sprained ankle

Connection of the ankle hold the ankle bone and links in position. They protect the ankle from abnormal mobility such as rotation, turning, and rolling of the foot.

A sprained ankle occurs when the foot rotates, turns or rolls beyond its general motions. If the force is too hard, the ligaments can breach.

Achilles Tendonitis

This ankle injury is only happened by the extra use of the tendon at the back of the heel combined with an curious remedial  response from the body by reason of  it cannot handle the mass amount of stress being put in that area.

This condition is divided into two categories the first being insertional and the second being non-insertional. Insertion means that the pain is at the insertion point of the tendon where it attaches to the heel bone. Non-insertional means the pain is in the middle of the tendon.

It occurs due to repetitive strain from the improper joint movement of the foot or ankle.

These injuries can cause further complications like swelling, which can become a big problem if not attended to.