Comparison of Injuries in the First 3 Years of Premier Rugby Sevens Between Male and Female Players.

Abstract

Background: Premier Rugby Sevens (PR7S) is a new professional rugby league. Our study aims to examine injury data from PR7S over the last 3 years to clarify the incidence of injury per event and determine any trends within injuries to specific body regions related to both sex and year of competition. Understanding these injury patterns will assure relevant player education campaigns related to injury awareness, inform sex-specific injury prevention strategies, and help medical professionals care for athletes more effectively in future competitions.

Hypothesis: There will be a difference in injury patterns and data between men and women throughout the last 3 years of data.

Study design: Cohort study.

Level of evidence: Level 3.

Methods: This is a cohort study including the whole population of athletes from PR7S from 2021 to 2023. After each of the 9 events, athletes filled out a postevent injury form in Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act compliant electronic health record with their team athletic trainer which included name, date of birth, event, injury type, and location of injury.

Results: When comparing injury rates year to year, there was a statistically significant increase from 7 to 62 injuries among female athletes (P = 0.004). The number of injuries in male athletes stayed relatively the same. Despite having 432 athletes for both sexes, lower extremity injuries in female athletes have increased each year, whereas male athlete lower extremity injuries have stayed roughly the same throughout the study.

Conclusion: There were statistically more injuries in female athletes compared with male athletes.

Clinical relevance: These results are similar to other studies including other sports showing increased lower extremity injuries among female athletes compared with male athletes. More research needs to be done to evaluate the causes of increased injuries into to develop prevention strategies in rugby and in other sports.