Physician-Prescribed Medication Use by the Finnish Paralympic and Olympic Athletes

Abstract

The use of any physician-prescribed medicines, especially those to treat chronic diseases, seems to be more common among the PAs than the OAs. Paralympic athletes use significantly less asthma medicines than OAs.

Medication and Supplement Use in Disability Football World Championships

“…The active pharmaceutical ingredient of each substance was identified to categorize the medication or supplement into one of the following: analgesia and anti‐inflammatory medications (NSAIDs, other analgesia, local anesthetics), muscle relaxants, respiratory agents, gastrointestinal medications, antimicrobial medications, antihistamines, supplements, and others. This classification is consistent with previous pharmacoepidemiologic studies in sport [6‐21].…”

“…Previous research in able‐bodied athletes has revealed high and unexpected levels of medication use, especially of NSAIDs [6‐19]. In keeping with much of this research, NSAIDs were by far the most commonly used medication in disability footballers in our cohort, representing 39.3% of all medications used.…”

“…In this study, the overall incidence of medication use per athlete was lower in Paralympic athletes than their Olympic counterparts, and fewer individual Paralympic athletes used a high number of medications compared with individual Olympic athletes [10]. In contrast with these findings, a later study with direct comparison of medication use in Paralympic and Olympic athletes [11] concluded that the use of physician‐prescribed medication, especially those used to treat chronic disease, is higher in Paralympic athletes than Olympic athletes with the exception of asthma medicines.…”

“…This is the first study to investigate medication and supplement use in elite disability football, in comparison with previous studies, which looked at either a country‐specific cohort [11] and/or a cohort of all athletes at a Paralympic Games [10]. The results from the present study indicate the widespread use of medications and supplements at 2 disability football world cups.…”

International Olympic Committee consensus statement on pain management in elite athletes

“…Understanding how pain is experienced by an athlete is important 280. Part of the socialisation of athletes in male sport includes a degree of (hyper)masculinisation, leading to efforts to disregard or downplay pain and injury 281.…”