Assessing the prevalence of injuries in competitive rowing athletes: the effects of body location, sex, and perceived fatigue

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to; assess the lifetime prevalence of musculoskeletal injures, based on different anatomical regions, including the perceptions of muscular fatigue as a contributing factor to these injuries in recreational rowing athletes; to assess the relative effect of muscle fatigue on musculoskeletal injury in male and female athletes, respectively; to assess the effect of sex on LBP prevalence and severity in recreational rowing athletes. With this purpose in mind a survey was conducted involving rowing athletes across all ages and sexes. In this survey information on rowing experience, injury history, prevalence of low back pain, subjective level of fatigue at the time of injury, activity at the time of most severe injury, and type of pain with most severe injury. The most severe injury incurred for participants most commonly on a rowing ergometer (n=31), followed by training on the water (sweep n=26, scull n=24), most severe injuries were described as a dull pain (n=77). The most common injury site was the back, which had a significantly higher prevalence than the upper body, lower body and other injury sites. Injury prevalence of the upper body was significantly greater than the lower body and other injury sites, and lower body injury prevalence was significantly greater than the other injury sites. Lastly, Participants perceived that they were significantly more fatigued when a back injury occurred than injuries to any other site. Additionally, Injuries to the lower extremity had a higher perception of fatigue than upper extremity and other injury sites. The current work also suggests that there are no systematic differences in the prevalence of low back pain between male and female rowing athletes, nor in the severity of duration of such pain experienced at the low back or in other more general body regions.