Descriptive epidemiology of collegiate men’s ice hockey injuries: National collegiate athletic association injury surveillance system, 1988–1989 through 2003–2004

Association (NCAA) injury surveillance data for men’s ice hock-ey and to identify potential areas for injury prevention initiatives. Background: The NCAA began injury surveillance of men’s ice hockey during the 1988–1989 academic year. These data represent all 3 NCAA divisions; the last Division II champion-ship, however, was held during the 1998–1999 academic year. Main Results: The rate of injury was more than 8 times high-er in games than in practices (16.27 versus 1.96 injuries per 1000 athlete-exposures [A-Es], rate ratio 8.3, 95 % confi-dence interval [CI] 7.9, 8.8). A significant average annual increase of 1.3 % in game injury rates occurred over the sample period (P .05), but practice rates stayed static (P .77). Preseason practice injury rates were more than twice as high as regular-season practice rates (5.05 versus 1.94 injuries per 1000 A-Es, rate ratio 2.6, 95 % CI 2.4, 2.9, P .01). Th