What Are the Most Common Sports Injuries?

Sports injuries are fairly common, with about 8.6 million adults sustaining one every year in the U.S. If you’re an athlete or you commonly participate in a sport these types of injuries might be unavoidable.

At Jersey Integrative Health and Wellness, our doctors are here to help you with a full range of healthcare needs. That’s why we’ve compiled this helpful guide to the most common types of sports injuries, so if an injury does happen, you'll know and be able to seek treatment.

The most common sports injuries

Unfortunately, despite your best efforts, sports injuries are often unavoidable. Here are some of the most common injuries you can sustain while playing sports:  

Fractures

Fracture is the medical term for a broken bone. You may have a partial fracture, part of your bone is broken, or a complete fracture, all of your bone is broken. Some symptoms of a fracture include bruising, swelling, and pain. 

With a fracture, your broken bone may stick out from your limb in an awkward way. A fracture can occur in either your arms, legs, ankles, feet, collarbones, wrists, or fingers.

Thumb sprains

Much like your fingers, your thumbs are susceptible to injury too when you’re playing sports. This type of injury happens when the ligament in your thumb either tears or stretches past its capacity. 

Football players are most susceptible to this injury, which commonly occurs when catching a fast-traveling ball or when breaking a fall with your hands. 

Injuries to your rotator cuff 

Your rotator cuff is the group of muscles and tendons that keep your arm securely in its socket. The rotator cuff is what enables you to lift and rotate your arm. You can either sustain a rotator cuff injury immediately, via impact or over time, as a result of repetitive use. 

AC injury  

An AC injury is an injury to your acromioclavicular joint, which lies between your collarbone and your shoulder blade. An AC injury occurs when the ligaments that run through this joint tear or stretch past their capacity. Because of the area, this injury is often referred to as a separated shoulder.   

Tennis elbow

Tennis elbow, also called golfer’s elbow, is a condition where the tendons that run through your forearm, on either the inner or outer part of your elbow, become injured and subsequently painful. This condition is typically brought on by repetitive motion and overuse.

Labral shoulder tear

A sports injury can tear your labrum, the piece of tissue inside your shoulder that anchors your shoulder socket in place. This injury happens either as a result of impact or from overuse and repetitive motion. 

Do you want to learn more about sports injuries and how we can treat them? Visit our website here to schedule an appointment at one of our locations.