Management of Knee Injuries in Adolescent Basketball Players

Abstract

Basketball is one of the most common sports in the world and in the USA, and it is thought to be the most popular team sport for adolescent boys and girls with nearly a million athletes being registered during a given school year. With such a high participation rate, it is not surprising that basketball also represents the most frequent cause of sports-related emergency department visits in pediatric and adolescent patients. Second only to ankle injuries, knee injuries are commonly reported and more likely to be acute and/or severe. However, the diagnoses of “sprain” or “strain” continue to be the most common injuries in basketball with the majority of injuries being minor and time away from sport less than a week. Knee pain also represents one of the most common musculoskeletal complaints in pediatric and adolescent populations in general, with about half of physically active youth having some degree of knee pain each year. Although adolescent basketball players can sustain many of the same knee injuries as adults, the presence of open physes or growth plates, relative strength of ligamentous and soft tissues comparted to growth plates, and ongoing skeletal and neuromuscular maturation have implications on the type and severity of knee injuries sustained. Additionally, children and adolescents often have inadequately developed coordination or motor skills which increase risk of injury. Extrinsic factors such as poor training techniques, inadequate conditioning, poor coaching, or limited supervision may also increase risk of injury in these young athletes. This chapter aims to outline the most common traumatic and overuse knee injuries that the adolescent basketball player may sustain, with attention paid to diagnosis, treatment, potential complications, return to sport criteria, and expectations following injury. Although by no means exhaustive, it should provide a framework for the evaluation and treatment of these increasingly common injuries and aid in the safe return to sport for the injured adolescent athlete.