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August 18, 2006
ASBJ offers tips for keeping student athletes safeThe American School Board Journal's's August cover story, Keeping Student Athletes Safe, is rather timely given the recent high profile stories about student athletes collapsing during workouts and Little League baseball considering limits on the number of pitches young baseballers can throw. The article examines what it takes to keep student athletes safe.
The journal points out that "despite catastrophic scenarios making news, the vast majority of injuries suffered by student athletes are not life threatening. The National Athletic Trainers Association (NATA) estimates that about one-third of the 7.5 million students who play interscholastic sports will get hurt, but only about a quarter of those incidents will require a doctor's visit."
Fred Mueller, head of the National Center for Catastrophic Sport Injury Research, notes, "Catastrophic injuries are few and far between. But something like permanent paralysis is shocking to the community and to the athletes themselves."
ASBJ also asserts that "overuse, once the bane of seasoned athletes and the elderly, now accounts for more than half of all sports injuries among middle and high school athletes. The stress of repetitive and often improper movements on bodies that are not yet fully developed has created conditions like Little Leaguer's Elbow and Swimmer's Shoulder, and has made age-related arthritis an adolescent affliction."
Check out this story as well as the other topics covered in the August issue of American School Board Journal, including Board Member Boot Camp, School Uniforms, City-County Partnerships, and much more.
Posted August 18, 2006 3:49 PM | School Safety
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