To help parents deal with one of the most prevalent growth-related injuries that can cause long periods out of sport and activity in youth, we’ve decided to give you the Youth Exercise Centre’s two top tips for helping children deal with/ prevent the development of Osgood Schlatter’s Disease. In less than 5 minutes we will cover individual risks, aggravating factors, and how you, the parent/guardian and your child can help mitigate the risks of developing/ reducing the severity of Osgood schlatter’s disease.
So why does Osgood Schlatter occur, particularly around the pubertal growth spurt in Youth?
During the pubertal growth spurt, children experience rapid growth and development of the long bones, such as the femur, which can put increased levels of stress on tendons as they become stretched. As the tendons become stretched due to growth, the tendons experience concurrent increased stress as children become heavier and stronger due to puberty, particularly in boys who experience large increases in testosterone, causing weight and strength gains. Consequently, the patella tendon and the attachment sight on the tibial tuberosity become inflamed and children may struggle with activities that aggravate the tendon.
The sports that children are most susceptible to developing Osgood Schlatters are those involving high levels of sprinting, rapids stop-starts, changing direction/ agility and jump and landing. Football, rugby, athletics, basketball and gymnastic are all examples of sports that have high movement demands that are related to the risk of developing Osgood Schlatters.
1 in 5 children/teenagers will experience large levels of discomfort and frustration from the pains cause by Osgood Schlatter’s causing large amounts of absences from sport and physical activity. Missing out on sport not only affects children’s ability to learn new skills and develop their craft, but it may also negatively impact children’s confidence and self esteem as they are side-lined and have to rest for long periods of time.
So, what can you do to help reduce the risk of Osgood Schlatter’s developing and reduce the symptom severity if your child is currently experience it? Here’s the Youth Exercise Centre’s two golden tips:
- LOAD MANAGEMENT: If your child is entering the teenage years and doing lots of growing consider monitoring how many days they play sports back to back. Ensure children do not have a jam packed schedule of training and match days with no rest days in-between. Also consider what surface the children are playing on, astro turfs or hard surfaces like sports halls can be particularly aggravating.
- STRENGTHENING ACTIVITIES: Strength training the structure/ muscles around the knee and hip is fundamental to children’s development and reducing the risk of injury. Strength training has been shown to decrease the prevalence of Osgood Schlatters by 67%. A study from the Orthopaedic Journal of Sports Medicine, titled ‘’Activity Modification and Knee Strengthening for Osgood-Schlatter Disease: A Prospective Cohort Study’’ concluded that 12 weeks of strength training results in 80% of children reducing Osgood Schlatter symptoms and 90% after 12 months of training.
It is important to correctly manage and treat Osgood Schlatter’s as unlike other injuries there is no specific or general time frame for recovery or pain loss. If left unmanaged with continuous participation in high intensity sport then problems can remain for years and potentially leave permanent damage.
We hope this quick read has helped you and your child manage Osgood Schlatter’s and/or provided you an understanding on how to help prevent it occurring.
If you’d like to know more, feel free to reach out to our team!
