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Criteria in Return to Football

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Injuries and Health Problems in Football

Abstract

Lower limb muscle injuries are one of the major problems in football, representing one third to one fourth of all time-loss injuries. Besides great efforts in trying to improve prevention strategies, our understanding of mechanisms and risk factors is still limited, and reported injury and reinjury rates have not decreased in the last decades. One of the most widely accepted risk factors for lower extremity muscle injury in football is a previous identical or lower limb joint injury. Regular assessment of football players with lower limb muscle injuries should include objective and quantitative, clinical and functional tests with the potential to identify neuromuscular and biomechanical deficits. The interrelationships between all the risk factors involved in lower limb muscle injuries should always be considered. Ideally, progression through the different phases of the rehabilitation programme should only be allowed after meeting specific criteria. Return to play (RTP) decisions in lower limb muscle injuries should not exclusively rely in imaging results and should always be taken in conjunction with information obtained from other objective clinical and functional tests. RTP decisions in muscle injuries are very much related with risk management and will usually need of players and clinicians shared decision-making.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ripoll & De Prado Sport Clinic, FIFA Medical Centre of Excellence, Murcia, Spain

    Luis Serratosa & Hélder Pereira

  2. Hospital Universitario Quironsalud Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Luis Serratosa

  3. 3B’s Research Group–Biomaterials, Biodegradables and Biomimetics, University of Minho, Headquarters of the European Institute of Excellence on Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine, AvePark, Parque de Ciência e Tecnologia, Zona Industrial da Gandra, 4805-017, Barco/Guimarães, Portugal

    Hélder Pereira

  4. ICVS/3B’s–PT Government Associate Laboratory, Braga/Guimarães, Portugal

    Hélder Pereira

  5. Orthopedic Department, Centro Hospitalar Póvoa de Varzim-Vila do Conde, Póvoa de Varzim, Portugal

    Hélder Pereira

  6. Clínica do Dragão, Espregueira-Mendes Sports Centre – FIFA Medical Centre of Excellence, Porto, Portugal

    João Pedro Araújo, Rogério Pereira & Nuno Loureiro

  7. Medical Department, Al Jazira Football Club, Dubai, UAE

    João Pedro Araújo

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  1. Luis Serratosa
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  2. Hélder Pereira
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  4. Rogério Pereira
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  5. Nuno Loureiro
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Correspondence to Luis Serratosa .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Academic Medical Centre, Amsterdam Zuidoost, Noord-Holland, The Netherlands

    C. Niek van Dijk

  2. Hopital de la Croix-Rousse, University of Lyon 1 Hopital de la, Croix-Rousse, Lyon, France

    Philippe Neyret

  3. Department of Orthopedics & Traumatology, Federal University of São Paulo, Vila Clementino - São Paulo, Brazil

    Moises Cohen

  4. Isokinetic Medical Group, FIFA Medical Centre of Excellence, Bologna, Italy

    Stefano Della Villa

  5. 3B’s Research Group–Biomaterials, Biodegradables and Biomimetics, University of Minho, Headquarters of the European Institute of Excellence on Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine, AvePark, Parque de Ciência e Tecnologia, Zona Industrial da Gandra, Barco, Guimarães, Portugal

    Helder Pereira

  6. ICVS/3B’s–PT Government Associate Laboratory, Braga/Guimarães, Portugal

    J. Miguel Oliveira

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Serratosa, L., Pereira, H., Araújo, J.P., Pereira, R., Loureiro, N. (2017). Criteria in Return to Football. In: van Dijk, C., Neyret, P., Cohen, M., Della Villa, S., Pereira, H., Oliveira, J. (eds) Injuries and Health Problems in Football . Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-53924-8_37

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