ACL. MCL. Meniscus. Initials and words that are as much a part of the sports pages as RBI, PAT and REB. And of late, as much a part of youth sports as hair foo-foos, post-game tunnels and snacks.
According to an article published by the Cleveland Clinic, "in the human engaged in high-velocity, cutting, twisting, and jumping activities, the knee is the weakest link. In the United States each year, approximately 50 million young athletes participate in interscholastic or extracurricular sports. Each year, some 775,000 adolescent athletes are treated in emergency departments. Fifteen percent of these injuries involve the knee."
Interestingly, the article also states that "the adolescent's knee is different from the younger child's, the older teenager's or the adult's. It has very active growth plates, or physes, where bone growth occurs ... The growth plates in adolescents are mechanically weaker than the surrounding bones and are often weaker than the ligaments that hold the knee joint together. (Ligaments are bands of tough, flexible tissue that support bones around the joint.) As a result, some injuries that would cause a ligament tear in an adult or older teenager will instead cause a fracture through this relatively weak area of growth plate."
Your knee, courtesy of the the UC San Diego School of Medicine.
Yeah, by all means abandon a great diagnostic theory because it's difficult to prove.
Posted by: ferhuppy | April 06, 2010 at 08:20 AM