Upper extremity injuries in soccer

Abstract

Soccer both in terms of audience and both in terms of playersis the most popular sport of our times. Contrary to other contact sports, severe injury in soccor is not rule but can be expected. When these injuries are not diagnosed properly or not treated in true waysreturn time of the player tosport or normalliving activities will be affected negatively. In our clinical study we dealt with 80 cases (30.4%) in 263 patients who had upper extremity soccer injuries and who consulted Istanbul Haydarpasa Numune Hospital Orthopaedic Emergency Department between 1. 1. 1993-31. 12. 1993. AlI of these patients were male and amateur soccer players with mean age 20.8 (11-41 ). Of these injuries 59 took place in synthetic gross field, 12 were insoil field, 9 were in gross fields. In this study we accept upper extremity from phalanx to glenohumeral joint (including this joint). Navicular fractures, colles fractures and radius distal epiphyseal seperation were accepted as wrist region fractures; radial neck, humerus epicondyle and humerus supracondylar fractures were accepted as elbow region fractures. Clavicula fractures and one of the cases which is perilunate dislocation were not included in this study because this case wasn't diagnosed in another clinic 50 treatment of the case was Iate. If these injuries are classified according to anatomical regions 24 (30%) of these were in wrist region, 19 (23.8%) of these were in digits and metacarpal, 14 (17.5%) of these were in shoulder region, 12 (15%) of these were in forearm region and 11 (13.7%) of these were in elbow region. 46 (57.5%) of these injuries were fracture and 13 of these were dislocation. We corralated this high ratio of fracture and dislocation in our series as neglected or untreated traumas that accepted as minor traumas and treated in field out of hospitals.