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Tag: Sports Injury

Peyton Manning: Cervical Fusion and Return to Play

After a hard hit in the middle of a game, it can be a long nerve-wracking moment when a player doesn’t immediately rise to their feet. In football, specifically, there is always a fear of a spine or neck injury after a bad tackle. Neck problems are quite common in football, whether a “stinger” or something more serious. But when the injury is severe and surgery becomes a necessary option, there is life after surgery – even in professional sports. In mid-2013, a study was published of seven professional football players and eight professional wrestlers who underwent anterior cervical discectomy …

Cheerleading Injuries

Can you guess what sport causes the most injuries in young women? The answer may surprise you: it’s cheerleading, specifically the competitive side of the sport — which has accounted for more than 70 percent of catastrophic injuries in women’s college sports over the past 20 years. According to the Orthopedics Institute at Children’s Hospital Colorado, the most common cheerleading injuries in young women are: Strains and sprains of the neck, lower back, knee, and wrist Back injuries, including pain and stress fractures to the vertebra Concussions and other head injuries Cheerleading, though considered a competitive sport by colleges and …

Tiger Woods’ Back Pain

Tiger Woods was in his final round at The Barclays, undoubtedly within distance of the lead, when he dropped in pain to the green. The moment of gripping pain followed his second shot on the par-5 13th, and onlookers wondered if he would even be able to finish the back nine. The pro-golfer gingerly finished The Barclays, resulting in a tie for second place. Whether Tiger could have forced a play-off without his lowerback pain (LBP) is a question unknown, but he will not risk further injury by playing a previously scheduled philanthropic golf event before the second round of …

Rob Gronkowski for Lower Back Disc Injury

Recently, it was confirmed that New England Patriot tight end Rob Gronkowski will undergo surgery this June to repair a lower back disc injury, which has been troubling him since November of last year. Unfortunately, this is not the first or the last time we will see this type of headline in the news, as the rate of sports-related injuries continues to rise. Gronkowski is no stranger to surgery. In 2009, the two-time Pro Bowler missed his entire junior season at the University of Arizona, due to a similar, though unrelated, disc injury. Following the 2011-12 season, Gronkowski had surgery for …

Jarvis Jones – Spinal Stenosis

I see patients in my practice with conditions ranging from neck and lower back pain to spinal fractures.  From one patient to the next, the injury is never the same. This is most certainly the case with spinal stenosis, a condition that I often see and treat. Let’s start with what spinal stenosis is. It is a narrowing of the spinal canal that can occur anywhere along the length of the spine. The symptoms depend on what part of the spinal cord or nerve roots that are affected. Although spinal stenosis is more common in older patients due to the …

All-Terrain Vehicle-Related Spinal Injuries on the Rise in Children and Adolescents

Emergency room visits, specifically spinal cord injuries, are becoming increasingly prevalent amongst children and adolescents. Unfortunately, this increase is occurring from those who use all-terrain vehicles, otherwise known as ATVs.  For those of you who are unfamiliar, ATVs are 3 or 4-wheeled motorized vehicles that weigh up to 800 pounds and are popularly used for recreation. Although ATVs are not common on the streets of Manhattan, I am very familiar with the damage they create. There are thousands of ATV-related injuries amongst children and adolescents each year and reports of children as young as eight being treated for an ATV-related …