Injury management, rehab and prevention don't get nearly enough attention as they deserve for long-term team and player success, writes Rachel Doerrie.

The regular season is finished, exit meetings are taking place, and the players who are no longer playing are meeting with the media for the final time this year. Over the next 10 weeks, there is one striking pattern that appears as teams are eliminated: the revelation of injuries.

Every year, on seemingly every team, there is at least one player who says, “I played with *insert serious injury here*,” and it makes people scratch their heads. While I do not condone playing with serious ailments, it is more understandable in the Stanley Cup final to play with a torn ACL or separated shoulder than it is to play during the regular season.

Each team has a medical staff and should have a sports science department. Injury management, rehab and prevention are key pieces of team success. These pieces do not get near the attention it deserves. 

Other sports use technology like Zone7, Catapult and other tracking systems to understand each player’s body makeup. This allows the medical team to measure the load of practices, off-ice workouts and gameplay to determine when or if a player needs to be scaled back or have an off day. It also allows the team to more accurately monitor if an ailment is impacting the player at a larger level than he believes. Most importantly, it gives the medical staff the data to show the player why he needs to come out of the lineup or is not ready to return.

Teams in other sports who use this have seen fewer man games lost to injury. They adhere to the data and the advice of the medical staff. The science and data show that a particular ailment may lead to a more serious injury. For example, one company was able to identify a minor strain that led to performance decreasing and flagged the player as a risk for torn muscle if he continued playing. Identifying this and pulling the player allowed the team to properly manage a minor injury, and the player returned two weeks later. A torn muscle in this area would have led to a multiple-month injury that would usually require surgery.

There are some NHL teams that use Catapult data, but it is not collectively bargained. However, it should not take a fancy program and device for someone to realize that players should be on the sidelines with broken feet, high ankle sprains or Grade 2 muscle strains.

Brendan Gallagher said he broke his ankle in the 12th game of the season, was allowed to play through it, and broke it a second time. Not only is it a terrible idea to repeatedly break bones, but the stress put on the bones and muscles around a broken ankle puts them at risk for injury as well. 

Furthermore, the likelihood of corrective surgery being required for broken bones when they are continually used increases dramatically. Depending on the type of break, it can put unnecessary strain on the Achilles tendon, knee and hip joints. Injuries to those areas take much longer to heal and can become a recurring nuisance.

Other players played with torn knee ligaments or shoulder issues. While knee issues do not recur as often as shoulders, they can cause significant hip issues. Gymnasts and tennis players who compete with knee strains or ailments find their hips are negatively impacted over the long term and are at risk of injury. Athletes with knee issues found their hips were negatively impacted because they compensated for the knee ailment. 

The pelvic area should be approached with the long term in mind, as the smallest ailment can lead to back strains, groin strains or hernias. All of those have been shown to recur, specifically in hockey players. Not managing a minor hip ailment can lead to being injury prone in that area for years to come.

Similarly with the shoulder joint, the other ball and socket joint in the body, playing through ailments can cause ligament or tendon issues that may lead to repeat issues such as separations, strains or dislocations. Eventually, those require surgery, leading to a significantly longer recovery period. 

A Grade 2 shoulder separation has an average recovery time of four to six weeks. A Grade 3 sprain without surgery is 12 weeks, whereas a surgical intervention has a recovery time of six months. 

A Grade 2 separation can very easily become more severe in hockey when you consider the physical nature of the sport. By allowing a player to continue with a short-term injury, the risk of long-term injury increases, with the recovery time being up to six times as long. Not only is that irresponsible to encourage from a team standpoint, but it is also irresponsible to allow from a medical standpoint.

Hockey has a lionization problem. While fans and teammates may appreciate playing through injury, that should not be allowed in most instances. There is a major difference between bumps and bruises versus muscle strains and broken bones. Playing with a broken finger or toe is not going to have a long-term impact on the rest of the body the way a shoulder, hip, back or knee will. 

Participating in sports with a broken foot has shown to be detrimental to ankle, knee and hip areas because of the compensation that occurs. All this is before considering that players playing at 80 percent of their capabilities due to injury will have reservations in certain on-ice situations, which leads to increased injury risk. You cannot play timid in hockey, or you could get injured. The slightest hesitation in a split-second decision is all it takes.

The medical staffs of professional teams are in tough positions. They have athletes who believe they are superhuman and can play through the pain if they are shot up with painkillers. As Ryan Kesler and others have spoken about, that is a dangerous game to play. 

While the coach, the GM and/or the player want their guy in the lineup, it is the doctor’s job to stop them from themselves. It takes a tough person to play through serious injury. It takes a tougher person to understand their injury negatively impacts their body and their play and remove themselves from the lineup. 

As Tanner Pearson said, he’s less concerned about playing hockey and more concerned about being able to play with his kids. There is more to life than hockey, but it won’t matter if players can’t experience that life because they decided or were allowed to play through an injury they shouldn’t have.