Speaker: Basic hip exercises best for evaluating extreme sports athletes

BOULDER, Colo. — Basic hip exercises are likely to produce the best means to evaluate injuries in extreme sports athletes, according to a presenter at the International Extreme Sports Medicine Annual Congress.

“Working with extreme athletes…getting back to sport specificity, I think, is one of the highest things we need to get back to,” Sue Torrence, MS, PT, ATC, said, here. “But when you take into consideration all the [sports] that are out there, it is really hard to talk about the specific [sport in question], so I’m getting back to basics.”
Single-leg balance, single-let squat, lateral step-down, overhead deep squat and drop vertical jump tests are all methods to assess possible hip issues present in the extreme sports athlete, Torrence said. The drop vertical test in particular also benefits patients with anterior knee pain or ACL tears, although the focus should be to try to change the mechanics proximally rather than through the knee.

Torrence advised besides the obvious strains and sprains and chronic overuse injuries, low back pain, iliotibial band pain, patellofemoral pain and ankle instability should be screened for as well, as they all have roots in hip dysfunction. The upper extremity athletes should be evaluated carefully as “if there is any translational forces that are starting abnormally through the lower quarter due to flexibility issues, stability…it is going to translate into abnormalities through the upper quarter, so make sure you are checking shoulders as well as elbows,” Torrence said.

Orthopedics Today is the medical media partner for the International Extreme Sports Medicine Congress. — by Christian Ingram

Reference:

Torrence S. Hip rehab. Presented at: International Extreme Sports Medicine Annual Congress; June 13-14, 2014; Boulder, Colo.

Disclosure: Torrence has no relevant financial disclosures.