Elite female soccer players are at risk for menstrual irregularities and stress fractures [1] from the combination of intense training and insufficient nutrition, says a new study.1
Researchers recruited 220 female soccer players from nationally ranked clubs in the St. Louis area, an NCAA Division I university and a professional soccer team with an average of 16 and asked them to fill out a questionnaire about the age of their first menstrual period (menarche), menstrual history, and history of any musculoskelatal injury, including stress fracture, and to answer questions about their body perception and attitudes towards eating using an Eating Attitudes Test.
They found that:
Elite female soccer players are thus at risk for delayed onset of menarche, menstrual dysfunction, and stress fractures, concluded the study's authors, despite reporting appropriate body perception and attitudes towards eating. The likely culprit: a failure to consume the appropriate high-calorie diet [3].
The female athlete triad [4] consists of three interrelated conditions: disordered eating, menstrual irregularity/absence of menstration, and osteoporosis. Athletes in so-called "aesthetic sports" (gymnastics [5], dance, figure skating) and endurance sports (running, marathon, triathlons) have long been considered to be at risk for developing disorders related to the condition, but the prevalence of and risk factors for the female athlete triad has not been previously studied in soccer, despite the sport being the most-played sport by girls in the U.S. as far as sheer numbers.
Researchers expected to find that elite female soccer athletes would have low rates of menstrual dysfunction, disordered eating attitudes, and stress fractures, but were surprised by the high rates reported by athletes of menstrual irregularity and stress fracture.
"Girls who have menstrual dysfunction are at risk for long-term health problems," Prather said in an interview with MSNBC. "When you have menstrual dysfunction and you are not regularly having a period, your body is not receiving the appropriate amount of estrogen load it should." Too little estrogen can impact bone health, leading to the bone-thinning disease, osteoporosis. The "relatively high and even alarming rate of stress fractures" were also a concern, said Dr. Mininder Kocher, associate director of the division of sports medicine at Children's Hospital Boston.
The message for female athletes and their coaches, said lead author, Heidi Prather, MD, associate professor and chief of the physical medicine and rehabilitation section at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, is to make sure they are not compromising their long-term health in their desire to achieve excellence in sports.
Above all, be patient. Don't engage your daughter in a test of wills.
Posted February 14, 2012
Links:
[1] https://mail.momsteam.com/node/3295
[2] https://mail.momsteam.com/node/3352
[3] https://mail.momsteam.com/node/3014
[4] https://mail.momsteam.com/node/75
[5] https://mail.momsteam.com/node/400
[6] http://www.abstractsonline.com/Plan/ViewAbstract.aspx?mID=2841&sKey=cb7f22b6-2c5e-4339-890d-9ae087d2a030&cKey=490b78b1-88e8-48cf-80c8-024c6763fcda&mKey=BA8AA154-A9B9-41F9-91A7-F4A4CB050945
[7] https://mail.momsteam.com/health-safety/female-athletes/female-athlete-triad/female-athlete-triad
[8] https://mail.momsteam.com/c/female-athlete-triad-primer-parents
[9] https://mail.momsteam.com/nutrition/youth-soccer-players-need-high-calorie-diet
[10] https://mail.momsteam.com/stress-fractures/stress-fractures-in-high-school-athletes-growing-problem
[11] https://mail.momsteam.com/health-safety/stress-fracture-risk-double-girls-in-high-impact-sports