Prevalence and Pattern of Musculoskeletal Injuries among Recreational Wightlifters in Nnewi, Nigeria

Background: Weightlifters are prone to musculoskeletal injury. However, studies on the prevalence and pattern of musculoskeletal injuries among weightlifters in Nigeria are not available. Therefore, this study investigated the prevalence and pattern of musculoskeletal injury among recreational weightlifters in Nnewi, Nigeria and explored the association between the prevalence of injury and sociodemographic, and training characteristic variables. Method: Ninety-one recreational weightlifters participated in this cross-sectional survey. An adapted, content-validated and pilot-tested self-administered questionnaire which captured information on participants’ socio-demographics, training characteristics, injury prevalence and patterns during weightlifting in the past 6 months was used. Data were summarized using descriptive statistics and analyzed using Chi-square with alpha level at 0.05. Results: The prevalence of musculoskeletal injury was 47.3% and the most injured body part was the shoulder (41.8%). There was significant association between the prevalence of injury and lack of supervision (p = 0.01), and between the prevalence of injury and training multiple times a day (p = 0.03). Conclusion: Musculoskeletal injury is quite prevalent among recreational weightlifters with the shoulder being the most injured body parts. Training multiple times a day and lack of supervision were associated with the prevalence of injury.