Elbow, Wrist and Hand Tendinopathies in Badminton Players

Abstract

Badminton is one of the most popular sports worldwide. Pathophysiology of badminton injuries is reported to be dominated by overuse injuries and upper limb accounts for approximately one third of overuse injuries mainly to tendons, which are known as tendinopathies. A descriptive cross sectional study was conducted including 25 badminton players, to investigate occurrence and associated factors of elbow, wrist and hand tendinopathies in badminton players. A interviewer administered questionnaire was used to obtain descriptive data (age, sex, level of the player, standards of warm up and cool down, components of training schedule (ex. strengthening exercises, flexibility exercises), intensity of practice (Duration, frequency), duration of playing of the racquet sport and previous injuries to upper limb) from the players. Player’s height, weight, pain response, palm length, finger length, thumb length, palm width, grip strength, active/passive and painful/ pain free Range of motions of elbow, wrist, hand movements, racquet weight, racquet grip size were measured. An overall occurence of 28% of elbow, wrist and hand tendinopathies was recorded. Among them 20% were elbow tendinopathies, 4% were wrist tendinopathies and 4% were hand tendinopathies. Among all, most commonly reportedtendinopathy was lateral epicondylitis (45.9%). There was no significant association observed between occurence of elbow, wrist and hand tendinopathies with intrinsic factors as age, gender, body mass index and hand anthropometries.Out of extrinsic factors, level of player (competitive/recreational), duration of play, history of previous upper limb injuries, training hours per week, strenghening exercises to upper limb, racket characteristics warm up and cool down exercises practices did not show any significant association with elbow, wrist and hand tendinopathies. Performing upper limb flexibility exercises showed a significant association (p < 0.05) with elbow, wrist and hand tendinopathies.The occurrence of elbow, wrist or hand tendinopathy was higher in players who did not perform routine upper limb flexibility exercises.