Ever wondered what are the common injuries hockey players versus basketball players get? Curious about how to treat your own basketball injuries? Keep reading to find out what injuries hockey, soccer, and basketball players get and how they treat those injuries.
Disclosure: This post is for informational purposes only. If your child has one of these common injuries, please take your child to the nearest emergency room, urgent care, or doctors office for care.
Hockey
Hockey is a pretty contact aggressive sport. There are a lot of ramming into each other or the walls on the ice, so it’s not surprising that most hockey players come home with a few injuries after a tough game. Hockey players commonly get concussions, shoulder separations, and MCL injuries.
Concussions can make a player feel confused, nauseous, blur their vision, and give them a headache. When players in any sport get a concussion, they are supposed to stop playing and get evaluated by a medical professional before playing again.
Shoulder separations and broken collarbones are fairly common in hockey. When a hockey player sustains a shoulder injury, they need to use a sling and rest their shoulders. In some more severe cases, a player might need surgery to help the shoulder heal correctly.
MCL injuries, or Medial Collateral Ligament injuries, happen when the inside of the knee is overly stretched. MCL injuries are more common than ACL injuries in hockey. The constant pushing off of the inside of the skate blade and contact on the outside of the knee from other players can cause MCL injuries. Hockey players who get an MCL injury should rest, ice, and elevate their knee while taking pain killers to help reduce the pain and inflammation.
Soccer
Soccer players often get sprains, strains, shin splints, stress fractures, and concussions. Like hockey players, soccer players who get a concussion are taken out of the game and are not allowed to play until they see a medical professional and are cleared of symptoms and are told it is okay to play again.
Sprains, strains, and shin splints are all treated very similarly. Rest, ice, elevation, and taking anti-inflammatories can help each of these soccer injuries. More intense injuries like stress fractures require going to a doctor and receiving professional medical help. Soccer players need to be careful when they start feeling like they have a sprain or strain because with overuse these injuries could lead to a stress fracture.
Basketball
Basketball is full of a lot of quick runs, stops, and turns. Because of the nature of the game, it is common for basketball players to experience ankle sprains, ACL tears, tendonitis, and also get finger injuries.
For sprained ankles, rest, ice, elevation, and anti-inflammatories can help reduce pain and swelling. Sometimes a brace might be used to help stabilize the ankle and limit the motion it can do while it heals. Tendonitis can be treated in the same ways.
ACL tear treatment depends on the severity of the tear. Some minor tears will only need to be treated with rest, ice, elevation, anti-inflammatories, and crutches. More intense tears will require a brace or surgery along with physical therapy to help it heal correctly.
The most common finger injury basketball players get is a jammed finger. To treat a jammed finger, a player should rest, ice, and elevate their finger. They should also use a splint to keep their finger from bending, this will help speed up the healing process and make sure the finger heals correctly.
There are so many benefits to putting your child in team sports but with sports comes potential injuries. Most people would consider football to be the most dangerous sport but these sports are high on the list too. So whether you have a hockey, soccer, or basketball player, your child could be at risk for these common injuries.
