The Epidemiology of Injury in British American Football University Sport: A Single Site Prospective Cohort Study

Background and aim:
American Football is a developing sport in the United Kingdom. Establishing injury rates is the first part of any injury prevention strategy. To date, medically reported injury rates amongst British American Football (AF) university athletes are limited. Therefore, this study aimed to estimate the prevalence, severity, mechanism and period of game related injury in a British university AF team over one season.

Methods:
Twenty-four male university AF players were observed. The consensus statement on injury definitions in rugby union (2007) and the Community Rugby Injury Surveillance and Prevention (CRISP) programme were followed. Several injury factors were measured (e.g., injury site, type, severity, mechanism etc.). One variable chi squared tests (x2) calculated if expected values were significantly different from observed values.

Results:
Thirty-two injuries were sustained across the 9-game season, a clinical incidence of 0.75. Contact injures accounted for 68.8% of all injuries. Common sites of injury were the knee (21.9%) and shoulder (15.6%), whilst ligament (25%), muscle (21.9%) and haematoma (21.9%) injuries were most frequent types. Forty percent (12/32) of injuries had moderate severity.

Conclusion:
This is the first prospective medically reported cohort study to estimate the prevalence, severity, mechanism and period of injury in a single British university AF team. Findings are comparable to studies from the United States, with injures due to contact being the most frequent. However further research is needed to determine whether these findings are representative of wider British university leagues.

Practical Implications:
The data generated from this study allows the multidisciplinary sports science team to focus injury risk reduction strategies by region and injury type.