More and more people, who are over forty or those born in 1946 to 1964, commonly known as baby boomers, are realizing the benefits of taking up sports or exercising in a gym.
This is well and good since exercising regularly severely cut the risks of contracting aging and obesity related potentially killer diseases such as diabetes, heart diseases, stroke, some forms of cancers and many other diseases.
It is indeed heartening to know that more baby boomers are taking charge of their health through regular exercise to improve their cardiovascular health thus becoming fitter and stronger. However, with more middle aged people exercising and playing some form of sports, instances of injuries sustained from these activities have risen substantially.
In the United States, these gym or sports injuries have become the number 2 reason for people visiting the doctor’s office just behind the common cold, reported by the National Ambulatory Medical Care in 2003.
A Consumer Product Safety Commission research in 1998 found that sports related injuries to baby boomers had risen by 33 percent since 1991 and contributed to US$18.7 billion in medical costs.
Outdoor sports such as tennis, jogging and golf are very popular with people over forties. Not to be outdone, the more body conscious baby boomers are also joining gym memberships in droves.
Gyms all over the developed world are happily reporting increases in new memberships year after year with a large pool of their members being the over forties baby boomers brigade, male or female baby boomers irrespectively.
As baby boomers get older, their susceptibility to sports injuries rise proportionately. As people age, their body degenerate along with the aging process, although exercising regularly is known to slow down this very degeneration process. This is particularly so for the risky weekend warriors who take to the running tracks or lifting weights to build their body with gusto during the weekend putting their aging bodies and joints to sudden busts of unaccustomed stressful activities, causing damages to their own bodies unknowingly.
What are the common baby boomer’s sports injuries?