This NPR story about young kids suffering severe back injuries is yet another glaring reminder that today’s youth sports culture exposes children to too much, too soon. Dr. Neeru Jayanthi, an associate professor of orthopedic surgery at Loyola Medicine in Maywood, Ill. studied more than 1200 young athletes and found that lower back injuries are the third most common injury in athletes under 18. What’s more, these injuries—half of which forced kids to stop being active for one to six months—were most often caused by a combination of repetitive bending and hyper involvement in competitive sports.
