569 EP063 – Epidemiology of injuries in women elite artistic gymnastics during six seasons

Background Women's Artistic Gymnastics is a sport well known for requiring a heavy and exigent training load from the younger age to reach a high level of performance. This also is associated to an injury risk. Epidemiological studies are thus needed to improve injury prevention strategies. Objective To determine the injury epidemiology in French high-level Women's Artistic Gymnastics. Design Prospective data collection. Setting Elite Women's Artistic Gymnastics from national training center. Participants 43 gymnasts were included in this study, representing 111 gymnasts over six seasons Main outcomes measurements We conducted a retrospective analysis of injury data collected prospectively over six seasons from the 2014–2015 season to the 2019–2020 season among French high-level women's artistic gymnasts from the France Gymnastics National Centre of Saint-Etienne. We performed descriptive analyses including the calculation of the one-year injury prevalence. Results A total of 285 injuries were collected over the study period, i.e., an average of 2.6 injuries per gymnast per season. On average, 91.4% of gymnasts had at least one injury per season. The knee was the most affected joint (16%), followed by the elbow (12%) and the ankle (12%). The most frequent injury type was so-called growth pathologies (16%) and bone injuries (15%). Eighty-eight percent of injuries required a modification of the gymnastics practise. Conclusions The results of this study allowed a description of the epidemiology of injuries in this population of young and elite gymnasts. This very high injury prevalence supports the need to improve injury risk reduction strategies in Women's Artistic Gymnastics.