Hitting Hard on the Heels May Hit Hard on the Bones [news]

Stress fractures are amongst the most frequently diagnosed injuries in athletes. Some reports suggest that the rate of tibial stress fracture could be as high as 33 – 55% of all diagnosed stress fractures. Stress fractures occur when sub maximum strain is applied to the bone at a frequency that normal repair processes of osteoclasts and osteoblasts can’t handle.

It has been suggested in the past that stress fractures occur as a result of high magnitudes of impact loading on bone, during physical activity. However it is now thought that it is not the magnitude of the loading on the bone but the rate at which the force is applied.

This theory would suggest that it is the first rapidly applied transient impact load that is implicated in bony injuries in the athletic population.