Trampoline carries high risk of injury, experts say
Posted August 12, 2016 6:03 pm.
Last Updated August 15, 2016 10:14 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Trampolinist Rosie MacLennan wowed in Rio on Friday — winning her second Olympic gold — and her success may have parents eager to get their kids onto the sport in the hopes they will follow in her footsteps.
But a Richmond Hill mom is reminding parents about the dangers of the high-flying activity after she fractured her foot at a trampoline park last month.
“I jumped up and I landed awkwardly. I felt something shift and that was it,” says Merna Daoud, who was celebrating her son’s sixth birthday with friends when she was injured.
Daoud’s experience isn’t unusual. In the last five years, there have been at least 1,000 trampoline-related injuries in Canada every year to youth under the age of 20.
“Trampolining is something that is a high-risk sport and that’s why we see it in the Olympics, and it takes a lot of training and dedication to get there,” says Alex Kelly, spokesperson for Parachute Canada, a national injury prevention charity.
“In terms of a recreational trampoline at your home or in an unmaintained facility, maybe a local park or something like that, we do not recommend that.”
The Canadian Paediatric Society and the American Academy of Pediatrics echo that advice because of the high risk of injury.
“Some of the most commonly reported injuries for hospitalization include things like dislocation and fractures,” says Kelly. “We see risk of paraplegia — people fracturing [their] spine and damaging their spinal cord.”
At Skyriders Trampoline Place, Rosie MacLennan’s home gym in Richmond Hill, certified coaches offer classes for beginners. Program coordinator Helen Saari recommends flips and tricks be done only under the supervision of a trained professional.
“When you hit the bottom of the material and it stretches to its maximum it’s actually as hard as a cement floor,” says Saari. “If you land on your neck or head in that position you are going to do some serious damage.”
Emergency physician and SickKids Hospital trauma fellow Daniel Rosenfield says two-thirds of trampoline injuries happen because of multiple people jumping at once.
While he doesn’t recommend backyard trampolines, he says there are safety measures parents can take if they already have one.
“The first … is only one child be on it at time — that’s really important,” Rosenfield says.
“Number two is always being supervised. Number three: Children shouldn’t be on them before approximately age six or older.”
