Abstract
Every day, millions of children and young adults participate in sports activities. They can range from track and field to football, swimming to soccer, and gymnastics to ice hockey. Involvement in these athletic endeavors helps a child improve their physical fitness, their coordination, and it teaches them to learn about teamwork. However, with such vast numbers of involvement, parents and caregivers should recognize the potential injuries that their youth may incur due to participating. Like other causes of injury to children, many sports injuries are preventable; they are not “accidents.” By recognizing injury patterns and by understanding the risks of each particular sport, improvements in rules and equipment and better preparation by the player could make a child safer when participating.