Objective Assessing body composition may be a predictive factor for the risk of trauma in sports medicine.

Methods Our study followed the athletes aged 12 to 18 years admitted to our Sports Medicine Department during the last 6 months of 2007. Three separate groups emerged: first, the overweight group (n = 124), the second group with normal weight and body fat excess (n = 215) and the control group with normal weight and body composition (n = 342). We performed a statistical analysis between the groups using the Chi-squared test.

Results The overall risk for trauma were similar in the first two groups (p>0.05) but we found a statistical significant difference between the first two groups and the control, third group (p = 0.001). We also identified particular sports predisposing for trauma associated with body fat excess: football, handball and tennis, while the martial arts, saber and judo were less related to the body fat excess.

Conclusion The body composition is a more accurate predictive factor for trauma in certain sports compared to the body weight.