Prevalence and type of injuries among gym members in Saudi Arabia

Introduction: Strenuous exercise and misuse of fitness machines can lead to injury. We conducted this study to better understand the extent of the problem and identify the causes of injuries, so we can develop and implement preventive measures to reduce the risk of injuries. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted through a self-filled online questionnaire prepared in Arabic. The questionnaire was distributed through social media to gym members between 18 and 55 years old. Results: In this study, we were able to collect 285 responses to our questionnaire. Most of the participants were females (71.6%) and more than half of the respondents were between 25 and 34 years of old (54.4%). The reliability results of the questionnaire showed that Cronbach's alpha was 0.749. Considering the prevalence of injuries among gym members in this study, we found that 29.2% of participants reported having injuries that were related to the gym with a mean frequency of 2.13 times. Moreover, the main affected body part because of injuries was the shoulder (40.5%), followed by foot (32.4%) and back (25.7%). Among 83 members who indicated having injuries at the gym, 58.1% of them reported visiting a hospital because of the injuries and 11.6% of them reported the need for surgical intervention. Moreover, the incidence of injuries was significantly higher in males than females (53.1%, 19.6%, P = 0.000) and obese participants rather than normal-weight participants (48.4%, 28.9%, P = 0.024). Conclusion: We had developed a validated questionnaire with good reliability to assess the prevalence of gym-related injuries, their causes, and type. Our results showed that the prevalence of injuries among gym members was 29.2%. This prevalence of our study was lower than reported in other studies. However, most of the reported injuries were among males. The most common sites of injury were the shoulder, foot, and back. The most common causes of injury were torsion, severe stress, and iron weights. Moreover, our data confirmed the previous literature that injuries caused by gym exercise could lead to serious consequences that lead to lower quality of life.