Injury prevention of student volleyball players aged 18-21

Abstract

Background and purpose Traumatism in student volleyball poses a threat to the health and performance of volleyball players, which requires the analysis of current strategies to reduce the risk of damage to the musculoskeletal system of young players. Purpose: to summarize the results of research on the prevention of injuries among volleyball students aged 18-21 years based on a review of the literature.Material and methodsThe research used the methodology of searching and analyzing the correspondence of literary sources according to the PRISMA 2020 protocol. The literature search strategy was documented, which consisted of 3 stages (search, verification, assessment of correspondence). The search was carried out in PubMed, WoS, Scopus, ScholarGoogle databases. A total of 5 articles met the inclusion criteria, which formed the basis of the analysis of the research problem.ResultsThe 5 full-text articles received for analysis, which met the selection criteria, highlight the issue of injury prevention among volleyball students by: improving technique, improving strength, modifying warm-up and pre-season training, clarifying the problem of injury. None of the studies were randomized. Only one study included a control group. The size of the sample of participants was from 11 to 37 people. The duration of the intervention was from 8 to 26 weeks. The study had some limitations that were reported by the authors. The effectiveness of the implementation was determined at the level of changes in technical parameters, physical fitness, the state of the musculoskeletal system, the frequency and severity of the injury. One study did not report outcomes for injury prevention.ConclusionsConsidering the significant popularity and prevalence of volleyball among students, only 5 studies were found that dealt with the problem of injury prevention among volleyball players aged 18-21. The proposed solutions relate to pre-season training, warm-up, technique improvement and strength development. They contain recommendations of a mostly complex nature with an emphasis on further individualization. In general, the presented approaches can be used in work with student volleyball players. But there are certain limitations regarding the availability of equipment control tools to student teams, cooperation with specially trained specialists (for example, physiotherapists), opportunities to attract additional time to prevention programs. The presented programs are not global from the point of view of injuries, and the interventions concern only the support of certain links of the musculoskeletal system of the players. The results of the study are encouraging from the point of view of the further search for ways to prevent injuries among student volleyball players. However, they should be treated with caution given the ability of a particular team to implement player injury prevention programs.