National study finds football tops high school injuries

William Atkins
Thursday, 03 September 2009 18:02

Science - Health

An Ohio study on severe injuries among high school athletes throughout the United States has found that football is the most dangerous of sports, and results in the most serious injuries. Overall, 15% of the injuries in high school sports result in severe injuries.


The article summarizing the study is titled “Epidemiology of Severe Injuries Among United States High School Athletes,” and it is found in the September 2009 issue of The American Journal of Sports Medicine.

Its authors—Cory J. Darrow, Christy L. Collins, Ellen E. Yard, and R. Dawn Comstock (from either the College of Medicine at The Ohio State University, Columbus; or the Research Institute at Center for Injury Research and Policy, Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Columbus)—conducted their study on over seven million students participating in high school athletics.

The data for the study was conducted between 2005 and 2007 on various injury rates, types of sports, and for both males and females.

One hundred high schools across the United States participated in the study through Reporting Information Online (RIO).

The researchers defined “severe injury” as any injury that causes the loss of sports participation for twenty-one days or more.

During the study, the researchers found 1,378 severe injuries during 3,550,141 athletic exposures.

They concluded that boys’ football had the highest number of severe injuries with 0.69 per 1,000 athletic exposures.

Page two talks about the data found for wrestling, basketball, and soccer.