Volume 183 - Issue 10
Spinal cord injury register for football: already tackled?
Authors: Thomas K F Taylor, David J Carmody, David A Parker, Myles R J Coolican and Robert G Cumming
Med J Aust 2005; 183 (10): 550. || doi: 10.5694/j.1326-5377.2005.tb07174.x
Published online: 21 November 2005
Published online: 21 November 2005
Thomas K F Taylor,* David J Carmody,† David A Parker,‡ Myles R J Coolican,‡ Robert G Cumming§
* Emeritus Professor, † Registrar, ‡ Surgeon, Department of Orthopaedics and Traumatic Surgery, Royal North Shore Hospital, Pacific Highway, St Leonards, NSW 2065; § Professor, Centre for Education and Research on Ageing, Concord Hospital, Concord, NSW.
tktaylorATmed.usyd.edu.au
In reply: We welcome the opportunity to comment briefly on what we consider a registry for spinal injuries in football should actually be. The raw data collected by the Australian Spinal Cord Injury Register is valuable for governments and other statutory bodies — for example, to plan for the enormous costs of acute spinal cord injuries (ASCIs), irrespective of their causation. However, a proper registry for spinal injuries from football (all codes) is a far cry from this. In particular, hospital records are notoriously inaccurate as to the way in which injuries sustained are documented, and to rely on them ensures misleading, if not spurious, data. We established long ago that interviewing players was the only accurate way to identify the mechanisms of injury, which are the keys to possible preventive measures.1
It is entirely relevant that ASCIs are at one end of a spectrum of vertebral column injuries (eg, fractures, dislocations) sustained in all football codes. Between 1986 and 2002, 65 footballers were admitted to the Royal North Shore Hospital with vertebral column injuries but no spinal cord damage. These injuries were sustained by the same mechanisms as their more serious counterparts and differed from them in degree rather than absolute kind. We contend there should be mandatory reporting of all spinal injuries to an independent registry and that football club registration should depend upon compliance with this requirement.
References
- Taylor TKF, Coolican MRJ. Spinal cord injuries in Australian footballers, 1960–1985. Med J Aust 1987; 147: 112-118. 0_BDHEGHFH