Football-specific extension of the IOC consensus statement: methods for recording and reporting of epidemiological data on injury and illness in sport 2020

Abstract

Several sports have published consensus statements on methods and reporting of epidemiological studies concerning injuries and illnesses with football (soccer) producing one of the first guidelines. This football-specific consensus statement was published in 2006 and required an update to align with scientific developments in the field. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) recently released a sports-generic consensus statement outlining methods for recording and reporting epidemiological data on injury and illness in sport and encouraged the development of sport-specific extensions.The Fédération Internationale de Football Association Medical Scientific Advisory Board established a panel of 16 football medicine and/or science experts, two players and one coach. With a foundation in the IOC consensus statement, the panel performed literature reviews on each included subtopic and performed two rounds of voting prior to and during a 2-day consensus meeting. The panel agreed on 40 of 75 pre-meeting and 21 of 44 meeting voting statements, respectively. The methodology and definitions presented in this comprehensive football-specific extension should ensure more consistent study designs, data collection procedures and use of nomenclature in future epidemiological studies of football injuries and illnesses regardless of setting. It should facilitate comparisons across studies and pooling of data.

Keywords: Consensus; Epidemiology; Football; IOC; Soccer.

Figure 1

Overview of key time points in the return to football continuum modified from Ardern and Pruna. The green arrow highlights the recommended end time-point following a time-loss injury/illness in surveillance studies (first full team training). The yellow line highlights the date of the first match (partial or full duration), used if occurring prior to the first full team training.