Injuries

Blisters happen when there sufficient rubbing of the skin and the skin becomes irritated, hot, and chaffed. If severe enough, blisters can lead to an open wound, bleeding, infection, and much discomfort.

A bone is considered broken when there is an interruption in the continuous flow of the tissue. This usually occurs because of a direct impact from an external source but can also occur from violent muscle contractions or repetitive abnormal use.

The musculoskeletal system is made of bones that form the skeleton along with muscles, tendons, ligaments, and joints. These things give the body shape, form, and stability. The bones and muscles work together to make body parts move.

A bruise develops when blood escapes from damaged blood vessels into the surrounding tissues under the skin, usually as the result of a blow directly to the injured area. The exception is a black eye, which may result from a hit at the temple or forehead, as well as on the eye itself. This happens because the blood follows a gravitational path. Bruised tissues under and around the eye are likely to swell, in some cases causing the eye to shut.

About 2 million Americans are burned seriously enough each year to require medical attention, almost half of them children. Although in most people's minds burns are associated with fire or flames, they can also be caused by chemicals, steam, and electricity.

Electric shock results when an electric current passes through the body, either from lightning or an artificially generated source. The impact ranges from a slight tingling to electrocution. Between these extremes, electricity may cause minor to major bumps and temporary to irreversible tissue damage. A strong electric jolt may also produce traumatic shock, in which the body's vital processes are profoundly disturbed.

Any break or crack in a bone is called a fracture. With a simple, or closed, type, the skin remains intact. By contrast, in an open, or compound, fracture, the skin is broken, either from the injury that caused the fracture or by a piece of the bone itself. Compound fractures are especially dangerous, because they usually involve extensive tissue damage, heavy bleeding, and the possibility of infection.

The condition called frozen shoulder begins as a slight pain and progresses to severe discomfort, which becomes worse when the shoulder is moved. Eventually, the shoulder stiffens to the point that it cannot be moved at all.

A head injury, also known as a concussion, is simply broken blood vessels that result in bleeding in the brain or the area around the brain. This can be very minor where the person is not aware of an injury or it can be so severe that the person dies within minutes.

Accidents that involve the head, neck, and back are invariably serious because of the dangers they pose to the central nervous system, namely, the brain and spinal cord. Because these injuries often occur together, the presence of a serious head injury should be assumed to involve also the neck or back (and vice versa) until proven otherwise by a qualified physician. The severity of a head, neck, or back injury is often difficult to judge. Superficial scalp wounds tend to bleed profusely and may look more serious than they are. In contrast, a seemingly minor blow to the head or a fall can cause serious brain damage or a broken back.

Although sports are sometimes unpredictable, most injuries can be, and should be, prevented. After all, no athlete wants to be side-lined because of an injury.

A strain is an injury to muscles and perhaps tendons -- fibrous bands that connect muscles to bones. It should not be confused with a sprain, which involves stretching or tearing of ligaments -- the fibrous bands that connect bones and strengthen and stabilize joints. There are two general categories of muscle strain: acute injury from sudden and excessive pressure in which muscle fibers tear, resulting in bleeding, swelling, pain, and loss of strength and function; and overuse injury, in which muscles become stretched from chronic stress. In the latter, muscles are sore, but they are not ruptured and there is no loss of strength.

Also known as heel spur, plantar fasciitis is an inflammation of the sole of the foot which can be painful. This injury or inflammation affects the tendon that helps provide the arch to the foot. This condition is very common with endurance runners.

Treatment involves lots of stretching, wearing proper shoes with an arch support, and rest if pain is present.

Being underwater increases the pressure on the body and on all the organs of the body. As a result, pressure related injuries most often occur in scuba diving or skin diving when the proper safety precautions aren't taken and the proper procedures aren't followed.

Caution must be used before putting an athlete back into the game. It's important to realize that sometimes a lot of pressure may exist to get the athlete back in the game. This pressure may come from parents who want to see their son/daughter play, from other athletes, from the coach, or even from the player themselves. But if a proper evaluation isn't performed the athlete may end up with even more severe injuries.

Runner's knee, a pain in the knee joint, is a very common sports injury. In many cases, no cause can be found; in others, overpronation, a tendency for the feet to roll too far inward, plays an important role. In a normal running gait, the heel lands first, and as the foot moves forward, body weight is transferred to its outside edge. The foot then rolls inward, transferring weight to the inside. This pan of the cycle is pronation, which distributes the force of each foot strike throughout the entire foot and leg and protects against injuries.

The term shin splints is often used to describe any persistent pain in the front part of the lower leg, but medically, the condition involves an injury to the muscles that attach to the tibia, or shin bone. The direct cause is scarring from small tears in the shin muscles, especially where they attach to the bone.

A burn is damage to the skin or underlying tissue usually caused by heat, but also by chemicals, electricity, or radiation such as with a sunburn. There are 3 levels of severity: first, second, and third. With third degree burns being the most serious.

This type of injury affects the spinal column or spinal cord which runs all the way from the upper neck down to the tail bone. This is where all the spinal nerves leave the brain and branch off, on their way down, to the various body parts. The higher up the injury occurs, the more body parts that will be affected. Motor vehicle crashes cause half of all injuries to the head and spine.

A stretching or tearing of ligaments, the fibrous bands that bind bones together at a joint, is referred to as a sprain. Typically, the surrounding blood vessels are also injured, resulting in bruising.

Although ligaments are very strong, almost any fall or misstep that twists a joint into an unnatural position can result in a sprain; in fact, a sprained ankle is the most common of all sports injuries. The knees are also vulnerable to severe sprains, especially among skiers. Improved bindings and inflexible boots have resulted in a 90-percent decrease in broken legs and ankles, but knee sprains have increased threefold.

A stress fracture is when a bone becomes damaged by overuse. This can happen when an athlete increases intensity or distance of an activity, changes from a soft surface to a hard one, or has improper form.

Overexposure to the sun is by far the leading cause of skin damage, with consequences ranging from mild sunburn to premature aging and even skin cancer. Most sunburns are classified as first-degree, meaning they are limited to the epidermis, the top layer of the skin. More severe, second-degree burns extend into the dermis, the inner layer of skin. Although very painful, these burns eventually heal as the skin renews itself. Third-degree sunburns, which damage both layers of skin as well as the underlying nerves and subcutaneous tissue, are rare. They occur mainly in babies or young children, who have thin, delicate skin that is especially vulnerable to the sun.

Tendons are tissues which connect a muscle onto a bone. They are very strong, but don't stretch much. When they become damaged, tendons can take a long time to heal.

Tendons are the tough, fibrous bands of tissue that connect muscles to bones; tendinitis occurs when these tissues become inflamed. Athletes often suffer tendinitis, and the disorder may be identified with a particular sport or activity to indicate its location -- for example, tennis elbow, golfers shoulder, runners ankle, or housemaid's knee.