Spinal Injuries and Conditions in Young Athletes

Anatomy and Development of the Young Spine.- The Young Athlete's Spinal Mechanics.- Acute Thoracic and Lumbar Injuries.- Acute Cervical Spine Injuries.- Concussion in Youth Sports.- Adolescent Overuse Spine Injuries.- Throwing Sports and Injuries Involving the Young Athlete's Spine.- Spinal Injuries in Collision/Heavy Contact Sports.- Spine Injuries in the Aesthetic Athlete.- Swimming and the Spine.- Spinal Injuries in Combat Sports.- Principles of Rehabilitation in the Young Athlete.- Congenital Spine Malformations and Sports Implications.- The Young Athlete with Down Syndrome.- Spinal Deformity: Presentation, Treatment, and Return to Sport.- Intrinsic Spinal Cord Abnormalities in Sport.- Metabolic Spinal Disorders in the Young Athlete.- Infectious and Inflammatory Diseases Affecting the Young Athlete's Spine.- Spine Tumors in the Young Athlete.- Return to Play after Spinal Surgery.- Adaptive Sport.- The Spine in Skeletal Dysplasia.

Dr. Lyle J. Micheli is one of the world's leading authorities on sports care. He is a professor of orthopedic surgery at Harvard Medical School, and a past president of the world's largest and most prestigious association of sports care professionals, the American College of Sports Medicine. Dr. Micheli is currently vice president of the International Federation of Sports Medicine and chairman of the Massachusetts Governor's Council on Fitness and Sports.

In 1974 Dr. Micheli co-founded the nation's first clinic focused exclusively on the care of young athletes. He remains the director of this unit, which in 1982 became officially known as the Division of Sports Medicine at Boston Children's Hospital (Harvard Medical School). You can find out more about Dr. Micheli's role in the establishment and development of the Division of Sports Medicine and more about the Division itself -in the section BCH Sports Medicine.

Dr. Micheli is the author of hundreds of published clinical studies and scholarly review articles and books. It is a measure of his standing that Dr. Micheli is in great demand on national and local media. He has appeared several times on ABC TV's "Good Morning America" to comment on sports care issues, and was a primary focus of an NBC TV prime-time special on sports medicine hosted by Deborah Norville. He was profiled in a four-page article in People magazine and an article about him appeared on the cover of USA Today.

From the reviews:

"This addition to the Contemporary Pediatric and Adolescent Sports Medicine series covers a broad range of topics related to spinal injuries among young athletes ... . this is a wonderful addition to the literature and a must buy for most libraries, since it can serve such a wide range of healthcare providers, including in primary care and surgery ... ." (Mark R. Hutchinson, Doody's Book Reviews, March, 2014)