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Calls to curb kids' sports activities as injuries surge

Author
Newstalk ZB ,
Publish Date
Tue, 4 Jun 2019, 10:58AM
There has been a 60 percent surge in ACC claims for sport-related injuries in children. (Photo / Getty)

Calls to curb kids' sports activities as injuries surge

Author
Newstalk ZB ,
Publish Date
Tue, 4 Jun 2019, 10:58AM

Parents are being urged to put the brakes on too much activity for their children.

Since 2008, there’s been a 60 percent surge in sports-related injuries for kids aged 10 to 14.

ACC says parents should limit the number of hours of sport per week, to their child's age.

Physiotherapist Sharon Kearney told Mike Hosking she sees a clear link in her patients between overuse of muscles, and injury.

"Some of them are doing an extraordinary amount of activity, and some don't have a day off, they don't have that day where they just have some time away from sport."

She says that she gets children who come into her clinic who fall into the 'overuse' category. 

Kearney says that it is hard to tell if the increase is simply due to more children or people claiming for injuries there never once would have, though she says that if the latter was the case, there would have been more of a linear change.

The rise in injuries is seeing an increase of adult-type injuries, such as stress fractures, which Kearney says we

"In Netball, our ACL injury rate and reconstruction, the peak used to be 20 to 24, it's now 15 to 19, and if we look internationally, it is getting younger in some sports." 

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