Study: Brain Injuries On the Rise Among Teen Basketball Players

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As childhood obesity reaches epidemic levels, anything that gets kids moving should be encouraged. But children’s sports are competitive these days. Whether at school or on traveling or club teams, young athletes are training harder and pushing their still-developing bodies to the limit. A surge in childhood and adolescent injuries was a topic of discussion at this year’s American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS) conference.

Now, a study released in October’s Pediatrics shows that traumatic brain injuries among children and adolescents from basketball games have jumped 70% in the past 10 years. With that said, the most common injury was a sprained ankle — practically a schoolyard rite of passage.

But the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, who aggregated basketball injuries among children and adolescents in emergency rooms throughout the country to find these results, reported that the injuries were still “a cause for concern.”

For more on how to encourage your child’s athletic enthusiasm while working to prevent concussions and other brain injuries, check out the Concussion Awareness fact sheet at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website.

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