Injuries in Irish Dance

Abstract

Irish dance is growing in popularity and competitiveness; however, very little research has focused specifically on this genre of dance. The purpose of this study was to analyze the types of dance injuries incurred by Irish dancers. A chart review was performed to identify all injuries associated with Irish dance seen in the sports medicine or orthopaedic clinics at the investigators' hospital over an 11-year period. "Injury" was defined as any dance-related pain or disorder that led to evaluation in the clinics. Survey data were also collected from study participants. Ultimately, 255 patients from over 30 different schools of dance were seen with injuries directly related (726 clinic visits) or partially related (199 visits) to Irish dance. Participants ranged in age from 4 to 47, with 95% (243/255) under the age of 19. These 255 patients received 437 diagnoses. Almost 80% of the injuries (348/437) were attributable to overuse, and 20.4% were acute and traumatic injuries (89/437). Ninety-five percent (95.9%) of injuries involved the hip or lower extremity. The most common sites were the foot (33.2%), ankle (22.7%), knee (19.7%), and hip (14.4%). Typical diagnoses were tendon injury (13.3%), apophysitis (11.4%), patellofemoral pain and instability (10.8%), stress injury (10.1%), and muscle injury (7.8%). The majority of traumatic injuries were seen in clinic within 3 weeks, but less than a quarter of overuse injuries were seen that quickly. The most common treatment, prescribed to 84.3% of patients, was physical therapy and home exercises, and the majority of dancers (64.3%) were able to return to full dance activity after injury.

Inability to perform because of pain/injury in elite adult Irish dance: A prospective investigation of contributing factors

“…As in other dance genres however (Thomas & Tarr, ) the accompanying risk of musculo‐skeletal pain and injury in ID can be substantial. Studies have reported rates of injury ranging from 55.9% (Stein et al., ) in adolescent amateur Irish dancers to 76.6% (Cahalan & O'Sullivan, ) in adult professional Irish dancers. Previous cross‐sectional research has identified that a combination of biopsychosocial and individual factors were associated with pain and injury in elite adult Irish dancers (Cahalan et al., ).…”

Lower Limb and Trunk Biomechanics After Fatigue in Competitive Female Irish Dancers

“…The role of an Irish dancer requires not only a high degree of muscular power and endurance but also movement aesthetics. 6 It is interesting that even though dancers in the study were fatigued, the maximal verticaljump height attained did not change from prefatigue to postfatigue. This result is contrary to previous findings that highlighted a reduction in vertical-jump height of teamsport athletes when fatigued, 21,22 potentially as a protective mechanism to reduce injury risk.…”

“…The right limb was chosen as the test limb because right-sided injury is more prevalent among this population due to the strong leading pattern of the right lower limb. 6 Adequate rest (45 seconds, allowing for a work-to-rest ratio of 1 : 9) 14 was provided between trials to minimize the effect of fatigue during the prefatigue landing trials.…”

“…1,3,4 Overuse injuries are common among Irish dancers, 5 accounting for almost 80% of all injuries. 6 It has been suggested that overuse injuries may be the result of the numerous hours they devote to dance practice and improving technique. 1,5 Noon et al 1 reported that more skilled dancers (who qualify for international competition) dedicated 10 to 18 hours to dance per week and displayed higher injury rates (4.2 injuries per dancer) than less skilled dancers (2.2 injuries per dancer), who dedicated only 2 to 3 hours to dance per week.…”

“…9 However, participants performed a drop-landing movement: this differs greatly from an Irish dance landing, 9 which has an aesthetic component. Therefore, despite the high injury risk in Irish dancers 1,4,6 and the association between fatigue and performance decline in ballet dancers 9 and other athletes, 9,12 research pertaining to the effects of fatigue on the lower limb biomechanics of Irish dance-specific leaps is lacking. Thus, the purpose of our study was to investigate the effects of fatigue on the peak lower limb and trunk angles as well as the peak lower limb joint forces and moments of female competitive Irish dancers during the performance of a dance-specific single-limb landing.…”