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Copyright 2008, Capital Newspapers Division of The Hearst Corporation,
Tom Keyser
November 11, 2008
Sandwiched in the middle of two defenders my weight went one way while my knee popped going the other way. I went down and couldn't get up.
That's how Karly DeSimone, a Shenendehowa High School soccer star, severely injured her right knee. And that's how she kicked off accounts of her comeback on the Times Union blog "Youth Sports" that drew attention — and passionate comments — to the rough-and-tumble world of girls soccer.
Karly, a junior, is one of many in the Capital Region living the reality confronting girl athletes around the country. Knee injuries, specifically tears of the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), have become more common as more girls play sports such as soccer and basketball that require sudden starts, stops and shifts in direction.
"In our small world of youth sports, I can count 10 girls who have suffered serious knee injuries in the past two years," wrote Joyce Bassett, a Times Union graphics editor and soccer/hockey mom who runs the blog, in the April 14 entry introducing Karly's first post.
The injuries are more common in girls than boys — three to five times more common — because of anatomical, biomechanical and possibly hormonal differences, says Dr. Eric Aronowitz, a local orthopedic surgeon who specializes in sports medicine. He performs about 75 ACL reconstructions a year, he says. About half are for high school athletes, and of those, about 75 percent are female, he says. He has operated on Karly and other female high school soccer players.
"Have you ever seen them play?" he says. "They're rough. They're very aggressive, very physical. I'm surprised they don't have more injuries."
Aronowitz's arthroscopic surgery on Karly in March was required to reconstruct the ACL as well as repair both the medial and lateral menisci of her right knee. Reconstructing the ACL, which connects the tibia (shin bone) to the femur (thigh bone), was most important, because it is the ligament most responsible for making the knee stable.
You can't reattach or stitch the ACL back together, Aronowitz says, because once it's torn, the blood supply is gone, and it is nonviable tissue. So he reconstructs it with other tissue, usually, as he did with Karly, using two tendons that he stripped from her hamstring just below her knee.
"I tell kids now there's a 90 to 95 percent chance that they're going to get back to where they were," Aronowitz says. "Six months later I expect them to be doing what they were doing before."
In Karly's case, that meant playing soccer.
Blogging through recovery
In the beginning I was not aware of a lot of things I know now about the surgery and recovery. I was also frustrated that I would be sitting out from what I love to do most (play sports). ... When I go to see my team practice or play, or think about the upcoming tournaments I will be missing, it's hard for me to not get upset and discouraged.
By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT and DAVE CALDWELL©1996-2008 Seattle Post-Intelligencer
BOB CONDOR
September 7, 2008
There is plenty to debate about how young is too young for organized sports. But if first- or second-grade girls are playing soccer this fall, then David Andrews isn't afraid to suggest there are specific drills or exercises that can protect those female knees.
It's not that Andrews is pushing girls to become elite athletes, even if he did just return from being the head trainer for the U.S. men's soccer team at the Olympics in Beijing. Andrews, who is with the Northwest Sports Physical Therapy group with offices in Tacoma and Gig Harbor, wants to teach young female athletes the best way to move in their sports.
His primary goal is to prevent the torn knee ligaments that are documented to be all too common as girls become high school and colleges players in soccer, volleyball and basketball among other sports. Studies show adolescent females are about eight times more likely than teen boys to tear the anterior cruciate ligament or ACL most central to a knee's health and stability. A significant amount of the research has been conducted at the University of North Carolina, Duke and the University of Washington.
"What we need to do is instill healthy habitual movement at younger ages," said Andrews. "If girls are playing in (under-8 soccer), it's a good time to coach the right biomechanics. If a girl doesn't play until she is a bit older, we can teach it then, too."
Less ideal is trying to reteach girls about knee-protective movements if they already are active participants in sports but without the right sort of dynamic training and strengthening.
"We like to say it takes about a thousand repetitions to change a bad habit or, in this case, habitual movement," said Andrews.
Copyright © 2008 GateHouse Media, Inc
Peter Reuell
Sep 09, 2008
Holliston football player Joseph Larracey, who died Friday after a pre-season scrimmage, became the fourth young athlete in the region to die since January 2007, raising the question of whether high school sports are more dangerous than in the past.
On the same night Larracey died, a student at Buckingham Browne & Nichols collapsed during a football scrimmage at Wayland High School and was flown to Boston Medical Center, where he remains in intensive care.
While deaths like Larracey's are tragic, experts say young people are not putting themselves in harm's way by taking the field.
"It's safe for kids to play sports," said Mark Laursen, director of athletic training services at Boston University. "The literature is pretty clear...there are so many health benefits from being active in sports, they far outweigh the risks of safe sports participation."
Following the death of an otherwise healthy 16-year-old, though, parents can be forgiven for wondering how serious those risks are.
"The trend is down for injuries," Laursen said.
According to data compiled by the National Center for Catastrophic Sports Injury Research, there were 13 football-related deaths nationwide in 2007, or .02 deaths per 100,000 participants in the sport.
In Massachusetts, statistics suggest the rate of deaths overall are similarly rare.
It is estimated between 150,000 and 160,000 students play high school sports in the state, said Paul Wetzel, a spokesman for the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association.
Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company
GINA KOLATA
September 3, 2008
UNTIL last spring, running was going great for 15-year-old Erik Kraus. He had been training hard without a break for 18 months and was becoming faster and faster.
Then, when spring track started, something went awry. Every time he raced 1,500 meters, his time was 15 seconds slower than in the previous race.
Erik’s father, Dr. William Kraus, a runner himself and a cardiologist at Duke University who studies exercise, was concerned. Erik was tired all the time; his legs felt heavy; he was frustrated, irritable. Could it be the condition that athletes dread: overtraining?
Overtraining is the downside of training, the trap that can derail an athlete’s success. It’s a real physical condition caused by pushing too hard for too long. It can happen with too much exercise, too much intense exercise, or both. Its hallmarks are poor performances, exhaustion and apathy.
“You just feel bad,” said Dr. William O. Roberts, an internist at the University of Minnesota who specializes in treating athletes and is a former president of the American College of Sports Medicine. “The spark is gone.”
It can come on so insidiously that before athletes know it, they find themselves trapped in a downward spiral. The harder they train, the worse they do.
But there’s another trap — the overdiagnoses of overtraining, said Dr. Steven Keteyian, the director of preventive cardiology at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit.
By Clem Richardson
April 14th, 2008
Daily News
When Frank Reali 3rd was found dead in his Staten Island real estate office a year ago this month, his parents pledged to do something in his honor to benefit the community.
What Francine (Fran) and Frank Reali came up with could transform high school sports in this town, maybe nationally.
The couple, owners of Safari Realty on Staten Island, wants to provide free magnetic resonance imaging scans for all students about to begin high school sports.
MRI scans provide noninvasive but remarkably accurate pictures of a patient's body.
Produced by passing the patient through a powerful, often circular magnet, these photos can show even the tiniest injury or abnormality.
By Ginal Kolata
February 18th, 2008
The New York Times
Last year, when Collin Link was 11 years old, he was tackled as he went in for a touchdown in pee-wee football.
“He didn’t get up,” his mother, Crystal Link, said. “He kept saying his knee hurt real bad.” But Mrs. Link was not overly concerned, thinking it was just a sprain.
But the next morning when the family was getting ready to go to church near their home in The Woodlands, Tex., Collin said he could not walk. That Monday, a doctor told the Links what was wrong.
Collin had an injury that doctors used to think almost never occurred in children. He had torn the anterior cruciate ligament, or A.C.L., in his left knee, the main ligament that stabilizes the joint.
By Cynthia Billhartz Gregorian
January 16th, 2008
McClatchy Newspapers
Elaine Gill, 16, wanted to run faster. So she started running more. A lot more.
Sometimes she'd run 50 miles a week.
At first the extra miles paid off for the St. Louis resident, and Elaine cut several minutes off her 5K cross country time. Then, during a race, a bone in her foot broke. Now, she can't run at all.
Such is the plight of a growing number of athletes, both male and female, who train their young bodies past the point of diminishing returns and right into injuries.
The American Academy of Pediatrics estimates that more than 30 million children and teens participate in organized sports each year. Of those, about 3.5 million seek treatment for overuse injuries and chronic fatigue from overtraining.
From the Seattlepi.comThe young gymnast and her mother were sitting across from Dr. Gregory Schmale at Children's Hospital and Medical Center in Seattle. There was no easy way for Schmale to give his news. He talked directly to the 12-year-old girl.
Your body is not cut out for gymnastics, Schmale said. The most recent injury to the girl's wrist was severe enough to warrant not only full rest but retirement from elite competitive gymnastics.
She was still in middle school.
Otherwise, Schmale explained, issues with the growth plate in the wrist would likely cause lifelong problems. It might mean the bone would stop growing, shortening the arm, or develop crooked. Schmale was the third doctor to tell the girl and mother the same bad news about the wrist and further participation in gymnastics.
What came next surprised Schmale.
Bob Groves
(Hackensack, N.J.) Record
Jun. 5, 2007 12:00 AM
HACKENSACK, N.J. - Hit by line drives, high sticks and 200-pound tacklers, more young athletes are ending up in hospital emergency rooms.
Some casualties arrive by ambulance; others are escorted by coaches or parents: A 15-year-old shortstop whose nose was bashed by a bad throw. A teen whose spleen was ruptured by a hockey stick. A volleyball player who was elbowed going after a spike. An elementary-school boxer with a broken thumb.
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