Groin Strains

groin 2

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By Ashley Pena, DPT

Groin strains make up 8- 18% of all soccer injuries and also occur in many other high intensity sports such as Ice Hockey, Football, Basketball, and more. They are typically found to occur during kicking, cutting, pivoting, changing directions, or when planting the lead foot. In a prospective research study looking at the athletic population, Serner et. al. found that in soccer players, kicking was the most common mechanism of injury at 40%. In other sports, changing directions was the most frequent mechanism at 31%. In addition, Serner found that 66% of these groin strains resulted in injuries to the Adductors (primarily Adductor Longus). Iliopsoas and Proximal Rectus Femoris were also found to be frequently injured with 15-25% of the groin strain participants sustaining these injuries.

Some factors which have been found in past research to be related to an increased risk of groin strains include older age, level of competition or experience, decreased range of hip abduction and rotation, isometric adductor muscle weakness or high abductor/adductor strength ratio, and poor performance in vertical jump tests. Specifically, in a cohort study done by Moreno-Perez et. al. it was found that players with groin injuries showed weaker isometric hip adductor strength and smaller Adductor/Abductor strength ratios than those without groin injuries giving evidence that screening for adductor strength deficits or Add/ Abd. muscle imbalances may be helpful in avoiding groin injuries.

ashleyBlog Post written by Ashley Pena, DPT Student from Cal State Northridge. At the time of publishing, Ashley was in her final clinical rotation with me at Catz PTI.

References:

  1. Elattar O, Choi H-R, Dills VD, Busconi B. Groin Injuries (Athletic Pubalgia) and Return to Play. Sports Health: A Multidisciplinary Approach. 2016;8(4):313-323. doi:10.1177/1941738116653711.
  2. Moreno-Pérez V, Lopez-Valenciano A, Barbado D, Moreside J, Elvira J, Vera-Garcia F. Comparisons of hip strength and countermovement jump height in elite tennis players with and without acute history of groin injuries. Musculoskeletal Science and Practice. 2017;29:144-149. doi:10.1016/j.msksp.2017.04.006.
  3. Serner A, Tol JL, Jomaah N, et al. Diagnosis of Acute Groin Injuries. The American Journal of Sports Medicine. 2015;43(8):1857-1864. doi:10.1177/0363546515585123.
  4. Tyler TF, Silvers HJ, Gerhardt MB, Nicholas SJ. Groin Injuries in Sports Medicine. Sports Health. 2010;2(3):231-236. doi:10.1177/1941738110366820.

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