High School Football Study Says Nearly 40% Are Hurt

High school varsity football injures almost 40% of its players, according to a national survey of the 1995 season.

The football figures are the first to be reported from what is to be a three-year study of injuries in 10 high school sports. The eventual results could help to pinpoint causes and rises or falls in rates, researchers said.

The study was done by the National Athletic Trainers Assn., a Dallas-based professional organization. Members using computers recorded data including the type of injury, its extent and how long the player was sidelined.

The study looked at 123 schools, less than 1% of all high schools, according to the project’s director, John W. Powell. But those selected represented the gamut of small, medium and large schools across the nation, said Powell, a sports injury consultant in Iowa City, Iowa. And, because only full-time, certified NATA trainers were data collectors, the report was thorough in accurately identifying injuries, he said.

The study found that 39.7% of the 6,529 players monitored were injured at least once during the season. Close to 81% of the injuries were minor, sidelining the player less than seven days; 11% were moderate; and the balance were major, defined as keeping the player out more than 21 days.

The leading injury types, counting for about 29% in total, were bruises, scrapes and the like. About 27% were sprains.

More than 7% of injuries were listed as fractures. But the figure is not as bad as it would appear, because most were stress fractures--minor injuries that could be expected to heal without incident, Powell said. Only 1.4% of injuries required surgery, according to the report.

Overall, close to 93% of injuries were new, with the balance reinjuries, the report said. This indicates that trainers are conscientious about getting injured players healed before allowing them to return to the game, Powell said.

Arms and legs got most of the damage; forearms, wrists, hands, ankles, feet and knees accounted for close to 45% of all injuries. But the largest single source of injuries, at more than 17%, were the hips, thighs and legs.

Most injuries occurred to offensive players, who accounted for 56%; defensive players sustained close to 36%. Special teams accounted for the rest.

Most injuries--more than 61%--took place in practice. But this does not make a practice session necessarily more risky than a game, Powell said; it could simply reflect the fact that there are more practice sessions than games.

The results of the 1995 study are similar to those of a 1986-88 NATA study, although the two projects can’t be directly compared because of differences in the two studies, Powell said. The latest work is more in-depth and focuses on varsity athletes, while the earlier project included all high school football players, not simply the varsity, he said.

Powell would not speculate about whether football is more injury-prone than other sports, preferring to wait for data on the other sports. But one high school trainer said some football players are bound to be hurt.

“Football is a collision sport, and whenever you have two bodies colliding, you are going to have injuries,” said Scot D. McClure of Coppell High School in Texas.