Sport-Related Ankle Injuries Attending an Accident and Emergency Department

Journal Article Guide

1) What is the title of the article? Title: Sport-related ankle injuries attending an accident and emergency department

Citation: Fong DT, Man C, Yung PS, Cheung S, Chan K. Sport-related ankle injuries attending an accident and emergency department. Injury, Int. J. Care Injured 2008; 39: 1222-27.

2) Based on the abstract, what do you think the article is about and what conclusions are made? Summary: This article addresses persons attending the accident and emergency department with ankle injuries over a 1 year period. 1715 sports injuries were recorded and of that 1715, 240 of the injuries were related to the ankle.

Conclusions: Several sports caused ankle injuries, but the majority of injuries came from basketball, soccer, and hiking. Almost all injuries were referred to an orthopedics specialist and radiography. There were no deaths related to an ankle injury.

3) Define any words that they recommend as key words or phrases. (Use a separate sheet of paper if needed). Epidemiology-the study of factors affecting the health and illness of the population Sprain-an injury to ligaments that is caused by being stretched beyond their normal capacity or torn Fracture-separation of an object or material into two, or more, pieces under the action of stress Sports medicine-an area of health and special services that apply medical and scientific knowledge to prevent, recognize, manage, and rehabilitate injuries related to sport, exercise, or recreational activities

Introduction/Background knowledge 4) List or explain 4-5 important pieces of information that are important to understanding the purpose of the research. 1) Ankle injury accounted for more than 10% of all sports injuries. 2) 80% or more were ligamentous sprain injuries 3) A survey reported that most ankle sprains were sustained while running, playing raquet sports and ball games 4) Study is aimed to collect current epidemiology data on sport-related ankle injuries attending an accident and emergency department.

5) What is/are the hypothesis that the researchers make? This is a survey paper, where they are trying to collect data. There is no specific hypothesis made.

Materials and Methods 6) List any equipment needed to perform the experiment. No equipment is needed.

7) List any materials that are important to the experiment. No specific materials are needed.

8) List or describe any population or human studies that are used. All attendances during a 1 year period from 1 January 2005 to 31 December 2005 were recorded. All injuries were classified into sports, common assault, indecent assault, batter, traffic, industrial, domestics, or self-inflicted.

9) What are the analysis methods that are used? Describe them if necessary! Skewness test was performed to show the distribution pattern for age. Attendance rate for all sports injuries, sport-related injuries, ligamentous sprains and fracture injuries were calculated. Skewness tests are designed to show the distribution of a specific feature of a population.

Results 10) What are the subcategories listed under the major category of “Results”? There are no subcategories. The results are cumulated in one results section.

11) Explain in your own words the results from each of the subcategories. This may take research! 23,569 A and E attendances were recorded. 14,290 were classified as an injury. 1715 were sports- related, and 240 were related to the ankle. Of the 240 cases, 193 of them were males and 47 were females. The average age was 24.6 years and the age distribution was positively skewed meaning that there were more young people coming into the emergency room. 99.2% of cases were referred to orthopedics, and almost all cases were also sent for a radiography examination.

12) How many figures are drawn? How many tables are made? Describe each table and figure. 2 Figures were drawn -Figure 1: Shows the number of attendances in ages. It is the skewness test. -Figure 2: Shows the injury distribution of the 240 patients with ankle injuries.

4 tables were drawn -Table 1: Shows the number of attendances in each category of injury -Table 2: Shows the number of admissions in each sport for all ankle injuries, sprains, and fractures -Table 3: Shows the type of treatment that was applied to all the ankle injuries, sprains, and fractures -Table 4: Shows the outcome for all ankle injuries, sprains, and fractures

Discussion

13) What are the important results discussed? -Age and type of injury sustained -Outcome of ankle injuries -Attendance rate and origin of ankle injuries

14) What is discussed about each result? Age and type of injury sustained: The majority of ankle injuries were males and most were sustained from basketball, soccer, and hiking. Outcome of ankle injuries: Use of radiography was very common even though only 1/10 of the injuries were fractures meaning many of the injuries were more costly than necessary. Bandaging was applied to many sprains, but its effect was controversial. The other common treatment was cryotherapy/ice therapy with compression. Physiotherapy was rarely used, and the majority of fractures were sent to the hospital ward.

Conclusion 15) What conclusions are made from the research? The majority of major ankle injuries wer from basketball, hiking, and soccer. Minor injuries were from running and jogging.

16) What are the larger implications of the research? (What does it mean to the general public?) The researchers suggested that sports medicine specialists should emphasize ankle injury prevention strategies in these sports.

17) Does the hypothesis agree with the results? Why or why not? There was no hypothesis, therefore there was not a connection.