Cable-wakeboarding has become more and more popular in the last years in Germany and worldwide as well. The mechanism, frequency and severity of injuries is still unclear and not described in the literature yet. Thus to compare the injuries of cable-wakeboarding with similar sports we decided to perform this prospective study during a six months summer season. The study included 122 actives with a mean age of 25 years (15 - 42, +/- 5.876), 81,1 % male, sending an online questionnaire to us every month. 98 % of the participants suffered 277 injuries during 8647 hours of activity, 108 (39 % 12 / 1000 h) had to be treated medically. We found out most frequently mild injuries (61 % 19.5 / 1000 h), 15 % very severe injuries (4.8 / 1000 h), 14 % severe injuries (4.5 / 1000 h) and 10 % medium-severe injuries (3.2 / 1000 h). Injuries of the knee and the shoulder dominated in more than 20 % each with more than 70 % distorsions and contusions.
Conclusion: Cable-wakeboarding is not more dangerous in regard to injuries than similar trendy sports even though the rate of mild injuries not treated medically is quite higher.
Copyright Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart . New York .