Oro‐facial injuries in Central American and Caribbean sports games: a 20‐year experience

Abstract

Dental services in sports competitions in the Games sponsored by the International Olympic Committee are mandatory. In every Central American, Pan American and Olympic Summer Games, as well as Winter Games, the Organizing Committee has to take all the necessary measures to assure dental services to all competitors. In all Olympic villages, as part of the medical services, a dental clinic is set up to treat any dental emergency that may arise during the Games. Almost every participating country in the Games has its own medical team and some may include a dentist. The major responsibilities of the team dentist as a member of the national sports delegation include: (i) education of the sports delegation about different oral and dental diseases and the illustration of possible problems that athletes or other personnel may encounter during the Games, (ii) adequate training and management of orofacial trauma during the competition, (iii) knowledge about the rules and regulations of the specific sport that the dentist is working, (iv) understanding of the anti-doping control regulations and procedures, (v) necessary skills to fabricate a custom-made and properly fitted mouth guard to all participants in contact or collision sports of the delegation. This study illustrates the dental services and occurrence of orofacial injury at the Central American and Caribbean Sports Games of the Puerto Rican Delegation for the past 20 years. A total of 2107 participants made up the six different delegations at these Games. Of these 279 or 13.2% were seen for different dental conditions. The incidence of acute or emergency orofacial conditions was 18 cases or 6% of the total participants. The most frequent injury was lip contusion with four cases and the sport that experienced more injuries was basketball with three cases.

A survey of orofacial injuries among basketball players

“…In this study, oral injury was commonly to the tongue and gingiva, while lip injury was the commonest extraoral injury. This is similar to the finding from the Central American and Caribbean Sports Games of the Puerto Rican Delegation over a 20 year period which revealed the lip contusion as the most frequent injury associated with basketball 9 . In this study, fractured teeth and avulsion were uncommon, which is in agreement with finding of other studies 16 .…”

“…A Nigerian study revealed that 57.9% of orofacial injury occurred in sportsmen and women with contact sports accounting for 78.5% and non‐contact events resulting in the remaining 21.5% 6 . Among contact and team sports, basketball obviously carries the highest risk of orofacial injury 7–9 and is the most frequent cause of sports‐related emergency department visits for youths and adolescents 10 .…”

Analysis of 627 hospitalized maxillofacial–oral injuries in Xi'an, China

“…In contrast to these results, many authors indicated that falls was the main cause . Other studies reported that sport‐related activities and agriculture‐related activities were the main causes of maxillofacial–oral injuries. The rank of injury causes of our study was not similar to other studies.…”

Correlation Between Sports-Related Maxillofacial Injuries and Head Injuries: A Five-Year Retrospective Study

“…In the present study, the mean FISS score was 0.79, and most head injuries did not require special treatment. We attribute this low mean score to different social and geographic characteristics, such as numbers and types of nearby culture and sports centers, surrounding environments, the characteristics of residents, and social factors 29–32 . This study was conducted in Busan and Gyeongsangnam-do Province, which have few specialized culture and sports centers and many tourism complexes and are located near mountains and the ocean.…”