Review
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Orthop. Jan 18, 2016; 7(1): 8-19
Published online Jan 18, 2016. doi: 10.5312/wjo.v7.i1.8
Football injuries of the ankle: A review of injury mechanisms, diagnosis and management
Raymond J Walls, Keir A Ross, Ethan J Fraser, Christopher W Hodgkins, Niall A Smyth, Christopher J Egan, James Calder, John G Kennedy
Raymond J Walls, Keir A Ross, Ethan J Fraser, Christopher J Egan, John G Kennedy, Department of Foot and Ankle Surgery, Hospital for Special Surgery, New York, NY 10021, United States
Christopher W Hodgkins, Niall A Smyth, University of Miami/Jackson Memorial Hospital, Miami, FL 33143, United States
James Calder, Department of Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery, Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, London W2 1NY, United Kingdom
Author contributions: Walls RJ was the primary author of the manuscript; Ross KA, Fraser EJ, Hodgkins CW, Smyth NA, Egan CJ and Calder J made the equal contributions to writing and editing of the manuscript; Kennedy JG was the senior author and made critical contributions to the manuscript and provided the final approval.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no conflicts of interest pertaining to this manuscript. Full conflict of interest statement has been provided for all authors.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Ethan J Fraser, MBBS, Department of Foot and Ankle Surgery, Hospital for Special Surgery, 535 East 70th Street, New York, NY 10021, United States. frasere@hss.edu
Telephone: +1-646-7146617
Received: April 17, 2015
Peer-review started: April 21, 2015
First decision: May 13, 2015
Revised: June 6, 2015
Accepted: September 16, 2015
Article in press: September 18, 2015
Published online: January 18, 2016
Abstract

Football is the most popular sport worldwide and is associated with a high injury rate, most of which are the result of trauma from player contact. Ankle injuries are among the most commonly diagnosed injuries in the game. The result is reduced physical activity and endurance levels, lost game time, and considerable medical cost. Sports medicine professionals must employ the correct diagnostic tools and effective treatments and rehabilitation protocols to minimize the impact of these injuries on the player. This review examines the diagnosis, treatment, and postoperative rehabilitation for common football injuries of the ankle based on the clinical evidence provided in the current literature.

Keywords: Management, Soccer, Football, Ankle, Injury

Core tip: Injury prevention is paramount in optimizing function and decreasing time lost from sport in footballers. Early recognition of foot and ankle injuries allows implementation of conservative measures aimed at improving function and reducing the risk of re-injury or development of concomitant pathologies. Treatment, whether conservative or surgical, requires an understanding of the mechanical component of injury (e.g., ligament tear, osteophytes), while additionally addressing the biological components affecting healing. This includes restoration of normal proprioceptive pathways through physical therapy programs while also treating the catabolic biochemical environment through selected use of biological adjuncts including platelet-rich plasma and bone marrow aspirate concentrate.