P3.254: The Relationship Between Wet Bulb Globe Temperature and Injury Incidence Among Youth Soccer Athletes

Background: Participation in sports offers young athletes many physical and mental health benefits, but injury is an inherent risk of soccer participation. While associations have been identified between heat stress and musculoskeletal injuries in adult athletes, the relationship in youth athletes is unknown. Therefore the purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship between heat stress [wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT)] and match injury incidence among youth soccer players

Methods: Injury data from U13 to U18/19 players was collected at Elite Clubs National League events throughout the United States from October 2023 to July 2024. All player injuries were recorded by on-site athletic trainers and player-hours were calculated for each age group and gender based on the number of matches, match duration, and number of teams for each day of every event. Daily temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, and cloud coverage was used to calculate WBGT for each day of play. Negative binomial regressions were used to predict the number of daily injuries from WBGT with log of player-hours as an offset and age as a covariate for all injuries and concussions separately.

Results: 804 injuries were reported during 24 events, representing 200,047 player-hours, for an overall incidence of 4.0 injuries per 1,000 hours. Of these, 160 concussions were recorded for an incidence of 0.80 concussions per 1,000 hours. Overall injury incidence decreased as WBGT increased (IRR = 0.98 [0.97-0.99], p=0.003), while no association was identified with respect to concussion (IRR = 0.99 [0.97-1.0], p=0.34). A significant association was identified between injury incidence and WBGT for all time loss injuries (IRR = 0.985 [0.97-1.0], p=0.032) but no association was seen with respect to non-time loss injuries (IRR = 0.988 [0.96-1.0], p=0.33).

Conclusion: in this 10-month data collection from nationwide youth soccer events, overall match injury incidence decreased as WBGT increased. No association was found between WBGT and concussion injury incidence or non-time loss injuries, suggesting that the association is driven by time-loss musculoskeletal injuries. These findings are similar to prior research in adult track and field athletes which found higher “feels-like” temperatures to be associated with lower risks of time-loss and muscle injuries during international competition. Prior research is warranted to better understand the mechanism of this relationship and whether it generalizes to other youth sports.