AIM CONTROL and SWECON - Handball The SWEdish CONcussion Study in Elite Handball

Handball is reported to be top 5 in Europe when it comes to sports injuries. There are few studies based on player reported data, and earlier Swedish data is mainly based on data from Insurance ´companies and mostly acute injuries. Earlier data lack the overuse injuries and number of injuries are taught to be underreported. This epidemiological study has the objective to create research based knowledge about the injury panorama within Swedish handball with special interest in head-injuries in the elite level. By using a mobile application "AIM Control", a retrospective weekly registration of handball related injuries was recorded together with self-assessed injury impact. Also data about sports/exercise exposure, other causes that could affect the players ability to practice/play matches, self-rated recovery before next practice/match as well as positive and negative affects will be analyzed. Special emphasis is given to self-reported head injuries and the symptoms that the player might experience during the handball season 2019/2020. Data about symptom severity will be collected and analyzed together with AIM Controls other variables i.e. duration of symptoms and time to return-to-play. In case of a head-injury the Medical support team is contacted in order to describe the event, and interviewed with standardized questions about their thinking and action about how head injuries should be managed and prognosis of time to recovery and how to decide when a player is ready to play again? This is part of the AIM Control study called SWECON - handball.