863 BO37 – Should lateral dominance be a topic for injury prevention in female competitive figure skaters?

Background Figure skaters typically jump in only one direction, landing on the same leg. Current prevention programs in figure skating lack knowledge about the importance of jumping direction in injury etiology. Objective To describe lateralisation (handedness, footedness, jumping direction) in female competitive figure skaters and its association with injury risk. Design One-year retrospective cohort study. Setting All licensed competitive figure skaters (n=400) in the southeastern region of Sweden. Participants 137 female figure skaters (mean age 12.9 (SD 3.0) years). Assessment of Risk Factors Lateralisation data and significant sports injury episodes for one year were reported by skaters. Associations were analyzed between handedness and jump-landing leg and between lateralization (right-sided/left-sided/mixed) and injury-sidedness (right/left/bilateral). Main Outcome Measurements Significant sports injury episode with time loss from sports >21 days. Results Most skaters reported right-side handedness (93%), footedness (87%) and landing leg (85%). The jumping direction (landing leg) was associated with handedness/footedness (p=0.035). Forty-two skaters (31%) had suffered a significant sports injury episode. Fifty-nine injuries (64% overuse/36% traumatic) were reported; 48 (83%) were located to the lower extremities; 35% of the lower extremity injuries involved only the landing leg. No association between left-sidedness and overuse injury episode (p=0.463) or traumatic injury (p=0.760) incidence during the study period was observed. Neither was any association found between lateralisation and distribution of injury to sides (p=0.328). Conclusions Right-side handedness, footedness, and jump landing leg dominated in female competitive figure skaters. No association was found between the side that injury was sustained and the skater's jumping direction. The relatively small size of the study implies that the risk of type 1 error must be considered. The results can be used to inform injury prevention programs for figure skaters. More research is needed on the contribution of laterality and asymmetric loading.