ArticleKnee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy : official journal of the ESSKA2023
Increased incidence of acute achilles tendon ruptures in the peri-pandemic COVID era with parallels to the 2021-22 NFL season.
Article in Knee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy : official journal of the ESSKA, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed, 7 citations in OpenAlex.
- Extrinsic Factors Contributing to Achilles Tendon Ruptures During NFL Games From 2010-2023: A Retrospective Analysis.Orthopaedic journal of sports medicine · 2026Article
- Rebound incidence of anterior cruciate ligament reconstructions in the peripandemic coronavirus disease era: An audit of centers experience.Bulletin of the Hospital for Joint Disease (2013) · 2025Article
- Article
- [Acute rupture of the Achilles tendon : Diagnostics, treatment and aftercare].Unfallchirurgie (Heidelberg, Germany) · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
purposeAcute Achilles tendon ruptures (AATRs) are a common sporting injury, whether for recreational athletes or elite athletes. Prior research has shown returning to physical activity after extended periods of inactivity leads to increased rates of musculoskeletal injuries. The purpose of this study was to investigate rates of acute Achilles' tendon ruptures at a single academic institute in the peri-COVID era, with corollary to the recent NFL season.
methodsA retrospective search was conducted using current procedural terminology to identify the total number of Achilles acute primary repair surgeries performed from years 2017 to 2021. Non-operatively managed AATRs were identified from the same electronic medical record using ICD-10 codes. NFL data were obtained from publicly available sites according to previously validated studies.
resultsA total of 588 patients who sustained AATRs and underwent primary surgical repair were identified, primarily men (75.7%, n = 445), with an average age of 43.22 ± 14.4 years. The number and corresponding incidence of AATR repairs per year was: 2017: n = 124 (21.1%), 2018: n = 110 (18.7%), 2019: n = 130 (22.1%), 2020: n = 86 (14.6%), 2021: n = 138 (23.5%), indicating a 7.5% decrease in rate of AATRs from 2019 to 2020, followed by an 8.9% increase in incidence from 2020 to 2021. Within the NFL, the number of AATRs resulting in an injured reserve stint increased every regular season from 2019 to 2020: n = 11 (21.2%), to 2020-2021: n = 17 (32.7%), to this past 2021-2022 season: n = 24 (46.2%).
conclusionAATR surgeries seem to have increased in 2021 following a 2020 COVID pandemic-induced quarantine for recreational athletes at a single academic institution and for professional athletes in the NFL, although these results are of questionable clinical significance. This provides prognostic information when counseling patients and athletes on return to activity or sport. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Level IV.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.