Epidemiology of in-line skate injuries: state of the art

During the last decade, in-line skating has become an increasingly popular activity. Along with the number of reports, highlighting the number of inju ries and their degree of severity, in-line skating injuries have to be cons idered a growing public health issue. The objective of this work is to repo rt epidemiological knowledge about in-line skate injuries and ways of preve ntion. A thorough search of all reports and publications on the subject was performed through the Medline database and in references of selected publi cations. There are numerous case series studies and several observational o nes, most of them undertaken in North America. In-line skates are used for recreation, sports, and transportation, in a variety of settings (parks, st reets, bike path, etc.) and by most of age groups (5 to 71 years, median ge nerally about 15). The most common site of injury is the wrist and forearm, although other parts of the body can be severely injured Age, sex, physica l training level, formal instruction level, lack of wearing of protective g ear, skating location, may be risk factors for injury. Some preventive meas ures were proposed by a number of research workers (information campaigns, wearing of protective gear, instruction, laws, etc.). Several preventive at tempts were undertaken but no one was appraised. In-line skates are used by all age groups and for a variety of activities. In-line skating is related to a great number of factors, such as cultural, social, geographic, urban and behavioural factors. Therefore, groups at risk for injury are very diff erent. Emergence of an important type of injury should lead to the developm ent of analytic epidemiological studies, based on particular groups of in-l ine skaters, in order to describe them, to identify and quantify risk facto rs and to design preventive measures, and then to appraise their efficiency .