Name: Julian Naranjo, MS2, Spokane
Title: Intrinsic Risk Factors for soft tissue knee injuries in alpine (downhill) skiers.
Why study this subject? “Knee injuries are responsible for one-third of all injuries that a skier is likely to experience in their lifetime while on the mountain. Knee injuries are complicated because they can be small and easily managed, or they can be detrimental, require surgery, and render someone immobile for extended periods of time depending on the severity. Our goal was to isolate variables specific to the skiers (gender, BMI, leg dominance, etc) and exclude other extrinsic risk factors (equipment, snow conditions) to see if we can identify risk for skiers that we can potentially intervene on for injury prevention or general awareness.”
“The hope is to provide reasons for further research about training and injury prevention that novice skiers can receive just as they’re beginning the sport.”
What was your role? I was the lead investigator. Since this is a narrative review of current literature, I was able to do all aspects of the project. This included article screening and selection, data extraction, and the final segment of writing the paper.
What were your findings? The four consistent findings we identified are that female sex, weakness of the core muscles, beginner skill level and non-dominant knees were associated with an increased risk of injury – those were all supported with statistically significant findings.
Personal reflections: “Ironically, I snowboard more than I ski. However, my engagement in this research stemmed from the fact that my wife suffered a severe knee injury while skiing which birthed my curiosity about risk factors in skiers.”
“I was excited to engage in this research because I have several friends and family members that have suffered knee injuries while skiing so I was curious to see if we would find anything that could give us direction as providers in the future. My foundations location Spokane thankfully has several ski resorts within a close distance so this information could be applicable to the current population.”
“Our vision for this multistage project is to develop an exercise plan or general recommendations for people aspiring to ski on how they can train their bodies to prepare for the slopes and minimize their risk of knee injuries throughout their career. This research gives us direction about what to explore next for injury prevention.”