Accidents, not body checking, cause most youth hockey injuries

Contrary to the common belief that checking among young hockey players causes the most injuries, an online study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine found 66% of their overall injuries were due to accidents, including players hitting the boards or goal posts, colliding with other players, or being hit by a puck.

The study, conducted by researchers at the University of Buffalo, which examined injury rates for 3,000 boys ages four to 18 years for a 5-year period — for a total of 13,292 players years, is the largest and most comprehensive analysis to date of young hockey players, according to a University of Buffalo press release.

“There is an image of body checking as a form of violence that is condoned by the game of hockey. However, this study found that body checking did not account for a large proportion of injuries. Perhaps as important, body checking did not lead to a rise in intentional injuries,” Barry Willer, PhD, a University of Buffalo professor of psychiatry and rehabilitation sciences and senior author of the study, stated in the release.

Injuries during play, practice

Willer and colleagues studied participants in the Burlington, Ontario youth hockey program, comparing injury rates overall for three levels of competition: “house leagues,” where no body checking occurs; “select,” in which players age 11 years and older can check; and “representative,” which consists of the most skilled players who are allowed to body check starting at age 9.

Additionally, researchers examined injury rates as the level of competition and age of the players increased and the differences in injury rates in practices vs. games. They only included data for injuries that kept a player off the ice at least 24 hours.

The analysis showed that three times more accidental injuries (90) than injuries from body checking (30) occurred in the “house leagues” and 28 injuries, the fewest among the competition levels, occurred in the “select” level. In the “representative” league, among 96 injuries reported, 59% were unintentional. That league’s 39 intentional injuries, however, were the highest of all the categories.

Skill vs. injury rate

“Game injuries were much more frequent among the highly skilled players on representative teams,” Willer stated, which correlated with the researchers’ predictions.

“The study does suggest that, regardless of whether young players are allowed to body check, unintentional contact with the board, the ice or other players are important sources of serious intended injury,” he noted.

A study of injuries associated with body checking in youth hockey in the Journal of the American Medical Association found a threefold increased risk of game-related injuries among youth hockey leagues allowing checking vs. leagues that disallowed it.

References:
Darling SR. Br J Sports Med. 2010 May 19. [Epub ahead of print].
Emery CA. JAMA. 2010;303(22):2265-2272.