Evert Verhagen

Amsterdam University Medical Center | VUmc · Department of Public and Occupational Health

Background: Ankle sprains are frequent injuries in general practice. However, no effective treatment is available yet. Aim: To examine the effectiveness of an unsupervised e-health supported neuromuscular training program in combination with usual care compared to usual care alone in patients with acute lateral ankle sprains in general practice. De...

Snow sports such as alpine skiing or snowboarding are associated with a high risk of injury and reinjury and are subject to a very special environment with specific rehabilitation challenges that must be addressed. Due to geographic decentralisation, seasonal climatic limitations, alternation of training in off-snow and on-snow settings and unique...

Contact and collision sports are those sports in which contact with the opponent is common or intentional. This chapter systematically presents current knowledge regarding sports-related injuries within three contact sports (basketball, handball, and football) and three collision sports (rugby, ice hockey, and martial arts). Each sport is covered s...

Background: Intrinsic values and priorities influence decision-making and are, therefore, important to consider explicitly in intervention development. Although health is generally considered an important value, individuals often make unhealthy choices, indicating a values disconnect. Study aim: To investigate how becoming aware of a disconnect...

Non-communicable diseases (NCDs), including coronary heart disease, stroke, hypertension, type 2 diabetes, dementia, depression and cancers, are on the rise worldwide and are often associated with a lack of physical activity (PA). Globally, the levels of PA among individuals are below WHO recommendations. A lack of PA can increase morbidity and mor...

Background Recently, esports have been argued to impact esports players' health, particularly for those competing at higher levels. Esports are a relatively new phenomenon, and an inside perspective regarding esports players’ needs and experiences is essential to promote adequate health support for this population. Thus, in this qualitative study,...

Background: Para athletes experience high prevalence and incidence of health problems related to sport. Despite this, there are few longitudinal studies. Objective: To describe the characteristics, prevalence, incidence, and severity of health problems in para athletes from one of the Brazilian Paralympic Reference Centers during a sports season...

Objective It is unclear what the incidence, prevalence, and nature of injuries are that can occur during playing padel. This study aimed to systematically review the incidence, prevalence, and nature of injuries in padel. Method A literature search was performed up to December 2022 through MEDLINE Ovid, PubMed, Cochrane Library, SportsDiscus and...

The IOC made recommendations for recording and reporting epidemiological data on injuries and illness in sports in 2020, but with little, if any, focus on female athletes. Therefore, the aims of this supplement to the IOC consensus statement are to (i) propose a taxonomy for categorisation of female athlete health problems across the lifespan; (ii)...

Context: Participation in sports is associated with a risk of sports-related health problems. For athletes with an impairment, sports-related health problems further burden an already restricted lifestyle, underlining the importance of prevention strategies in para-sports. Objective: To provide a comprehensive overview with quality assessment of...

Inleiding: Onderzoek heeft hoge beroepseisen gekoppeld aan meerdere nadelige gezondheidsresultaten, zowel fysiek als mentaal. Voor zover bekend, hebben onderzoekers de eigenschappen van militair politiepersoneel niet geïdentificeerd op basis van beroepseisen. De huidige studie heeft als doel profielen te identificeren op basis van zelfwaargenomen b...

Background: The objective was to compare the performance in field tests, dynamic knee valgus, knee function, and kinesiophobia of soccer players who were psychologically ready and not ready to return to unrestricted training or competitions after ACL reconstruction. Methods: Thirty-five male soccer players who had undergone primary ACL reconstru...

Background: Recently, esports have been argued to impact esports players' health, particularly for those competing at higher levels. Esports are a relatively new phenomenon, and an inside perspective regarding esports players' needs and experiences is essential to promote adequate health support for this population. Thus, in this qualitative study,...

Introduction: Research has linked high occupational demands to multiple adverse health outcomes, both physical and mental. As far as we know, researchers have not identified the profile characteristics of military police personnel based on occupational demands. The current study aims to identify profiles based on self-perceived occupational demand...

Background Research focusing on reducing the risk of injuries has increased over the last two decades showing that prevention implementation in real life is challenging. Objective To explore the experience and opinions of professional football stakeholders regarding injuries, their prevention and the implementation of preventive measures. Design...

on.soundcloud.com/XQb2T Link to first ever fully accessible audio publication of a research study so that people with visual impairments, who are the end users of this study, can access the research. Read by Mr Peter Drury, sports commentator.

Background A healthy lifestyle is indispensable for the prevention of noncommunicable diseases. However, lifestyle medicine is hampered by time constraints and competing priorities of treating physicians. A dedicated lifestyle front office (LFO) in secondary/tertiary care may provide an important contribution to optimize patient-centred lifestyle c...

Objectives To establish the effectiveness of the ‘VolleyVeilig’ programme on reducing injury rate, injury burden and injury severity in youth volleyball players. Methods We conducted a quasi-experimental prospective study over one season of youth volleyball. After randomisation by competition region, we instructed 31 control teams (236 children, a...

Objectives Athletes with impairments play sports with a risk of sustaining head injuries and concussions. However, the scientific knowledge needed to improve care is lacking. This qualitative study explores English blind 5-a-side footballers’ perceptions of concussion, concussion risks and prevention to improve para concussion care. Methods Nine s...

Background Research evidence is commonly compiled into expert-agreed consensus statements or guidelines, with an increasing trend towards their publication in peer-reviewed journals. Prominent among these has been the publication of several International Olympic Committee (IOC) tatements to help inform sport and exercise medicine (SEM) practice. Th...

Objectives Research evidence is commonly compiled into expert-informed consensus guidelines intended to consolidate and distribute sports medicine knowledge. Between 2003 and 2018, 27 International Olympic Committee (IOC) consensus statements were produced. This study explored the policy and practice impact of the IOC Statements on athlete health a...

Objectives To evaluate the effectiveness of a trainer-supervised judo-specific injury prevention warm-up programme on overall injury prevalence. Methods We conducted a two-arm, cluster randomised controlled trial; the Injury Prevention and Performance Optimization Netherlands (IPPON) study. Judo athletes aged≥12 years were randomised by judo schoo...

Background. Injury risk is high in Physical Education Teacher Education (PETE) students. Insights into specific injury locations per sex, setting, sports, and curriculum year are needed to develop preventive measures. Purpose. To compare injury distributions by body locations in PETE students and how these distributions differ by sex, type, onset,...

Objective To systematically investigate and document the infrastructure, practices, recommendations, and clinical consequences of a structured, organized sports cardiology multidisciplinary team (MDT) for athletes and patients who wish to engage in sports and exercise. Patients and Methods We established bimonthly sports cardiology MDT meetings, w...

Introduction Previous studies showed that the Nordic hamstring exercise (NHE) effectively prevents primary hamstring injury. However, no study investigated the secondary preventing effect of the NHE on hamstring reinjury. The primary purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of the NHE for preventing hamstring reinjury after return...

Objectives To investigate the influence of sports/activity types and their distribution over the curriculum years on intracurricular injury risk differences between curriculum years and sexes in Physical Education Teacher Education (PETE) studies. Methods In a cohort study over 14 years (2000–2014), injuries reported at the medical facility of a D...

Prevention has traditionally been categorized into three main areas: primary, secondary, and tertiary. In this Current Opinion, we present and discuss the concept of quaternary prevention in sports. Quaternary prevention aims to protect individuals from interventions that likely cause more harm than good, such as overdiagnosis, overtreatment, and o...

The objective of this study was to describe, from the Physical Education Teacher Education (PETE) students' perspective, sports injury prevention practices and map their suggestions for its improvement. In this qualitative study, we conducted 21 semi-structured interviews with PETE students from four different PETE schools in the Netherlands, which...

Purpose: To investigate differences in athletes' knowledge, beliefs, and training practices during COVID-19 lockdowns with reference to sport classification and sex. This work extends an initial descriptive evaluation focusing on athlete classification. Methods: Athletes (12,526; 66% male; 142 countries) completed an online survey (May-July 2020...

Cardiac sequelae after COVID-19 have been described in athletes, prompting the need to establish a return-to-play (RTP) protocol to guarantee a safe return to sports practice. Sports participation is strongly associated with multiple short- and long-term health benefits in children and adolescents and plays a crucial role in counteracting the psych...

Esports are a contemporary phenomenon, with millions of people involved. Still, scientific literature on the topic is scarce. Anecdotal reports, mostly based on what is known from videogames practice, have associated esports with unhealthy lifestyles and health-related problems. The present scoping review aimed to provide an overview of findings fr...

Background: There is much evidence to implement physical activity interventions for medical reasons in healthcare settings. However, the prescription of physical activity as a treatment, referring to as 'Exercise is Medicine' (E = M) is currently mostly absent in routine hospital care in The Netherlands. To support E = M prescription by clinicians...

Elite Para athletes report a high incidence of sports injuries, illnesses and other health issues. Despite this, there are few prevention programmes in Para sport, and many of the existing prevention programmes are not adapted to Para athletes. To improve the success of preventive measures, it has been suggested that sports safety work should facil...

Background Sixty million golfers around the world play golf. Golf injuries are most frequently located in the spine, elbow, wrist, hand and shoulder. Those injuries are often seen in golfers with more playing hours and suboptimal swing biomechanics, resulting in overuse injuries. Golfers who do not perform a warm-up or do not warm-up appropriately...

Background Several phenomena may point to potentially detrimental cardiac effects of endurance exercise, such as elevated circulating cardiac troponin levels and reductions in systolic and diastolic function directly after marathon completion. Furthermore, while myocardial abnormalities have been reported in patients who recovered from COVID-19, th...

Purpose: To investigate differences in athletes' knowledge, beliefs, and training practices during COVID-19 lockdowns with reference to sport classification and sex. This work extends an initial descriptive evaluation focusing on athlete classification. Methods: Athletes (12,526; 66% male; 142 countries) completed an online survey (May-July 2020) a...

Objective To develop a trail running injury screening instrument (TRISI) for utilisation as clinical decision aid in determining if a trail runner is at an increased risk for injury. Design Multiple methods approach. Methods The study utilised five phases 1) identification of injury risk factors 2) determining the relevance of each identified ris...

Objective: Identifying which types of athletes have increased injury risk (ie, predictive risk factors) should help develop cost-effective selective injury prevention strategies. Our objective was to compare a theoretical injury risk classification system developed by coaches and rehabilitation therapists, with observed injury rates in human circu...

Background: Limited information is available on the experiences of patients during rehabilitation after anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction (ACLR). Aim: The current study aimed to identify factors that differentiated positive and negative patient experiences during rehabilitation after ACLR. Method and design: A survey-based study with a...

This study aimed to explore how stakeholders in athletics perceived the relevance of injury prevention, determine their communication preferences, and describe their expectations regarding injury prevention. We conducted a cross-sectional study using an exploratory online survey with high-level athletes (i.e., listed by the French ministry of sport...

Background Promoting active (i.e., conscious, autonomous, informed, and value-congruent) choices may improve the effectiveness of physical activity interventions. This web-based four-arm experimental study investigated the effect of promoting an active versus passive choice regarding physical activity on behavioural and psychological outcomes (e.g....

Background Acute knee injuries are a key predisposing risk factor for knee osteoarthritis. Public health interventions require in-depth epidemiological evidence to determine which knee injuries are problematic in critical age and sex demographics. Methods Descriptive epidemiological analysis of longitudinal data on knee injuries (July 1998 – June...

Background Office workers spend a significant part of their workday sitting. Interventions that aim to reduce sedentary behaviour and increase physical activity might be more effective if greater attention is paid to individual perspectives that influence behavioural choices, including beliefs and values. This study aimed to gain insight into offic...

This narrative review paper aimed to discuss the literature on machine learning applications in soccer with an emphasis on injury risk assessment. A secondary aim was to provide practical tips for the health and performance staff in soccer clubs on how machine learning can provide a competitive advantage. Performance analysis is the area with the m...

Objectives Despite the many proven advantages of a physically active lifestyle in patient populations, prescription of exercise is currently not widely implemented in routine clinical practice. The aims of this study were twofold: (1) to assess perceptions of clinicians on the current practice of exercise is medicine (E=M) prescription in two Dutch...

Evidence-based injury prevention programmes for youth competitive alpine skiers are widely absent. The aims of this controlled 12-month experimental study were to introduce a novel injury prevention programme targeted to the injury patterns of youth skiers, called ISPA Int , and to compare the differences in injury occurrence between an interventio...

Background: There is much evidence to implement physical activity interventions for medical reasons in healthcare settings. However, the prescription of physical activity as a treatment, referring to as ‘Exercise is medicine’ (E=M) is currently mostly absent in routine hospital care in The Netherlands. To support E=M prescription by clinicians in h...

• To individualise injury risk reduction measures could help to better match athlete's individual characteristics and should thus improve their effectiveness. • To individualise injury risk reduction measures could help to improve athlete adherence into such measures and consequently their effectiveness. • This maximised individualised approach is...

Objectives To evaluate whether in fitness-related activities and recreational running over time, there is an increase in the number of novice sports athletes and whether these novice athletes have an increased injury rate compared with their experienced counterparts. Methods Data were collected from a large population-based retrospective cross-sec...

Objective To review and frequently update the available evidence on injury risk factors and epidemiology of injury in trail running. Design Living systematic review. Updated searches will be done every 6 months for a minimum period of 5 years. Data sources Eight electronic databases were searched from inception to 18 March 2021. Eligibility crit...

Although the benefits of current anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injury prevention programmes have been demonstrated in efficacy studies, they, unfortunately, have had limited public health impact to date. For example, the incidence of ACL injuries continues to rise in adolescent athletes. Raising awareness and educating coaches and athletes is no...

In this study, we explored the perspectives about sports injury prevention of Belgium Olympic level athletes, coaches, managers and healthcare providers from various Olympic sports. We conducted a qualitative study, including 17 semistructured interviews. All interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed by two independent coders through consta...