Background: Elbow injuries are common in young baseball players and evaluating the characteristics of young baseball players in a large-scale population is necessary. However, few studies have compared playing position, length of baseball experience, physical findings, and elbow pain in young baseball players. This retrospective multi-regional cohort study sought to document the physical findings at the elbow in Japanese elementary school baseball players and to examine the relationship between playing position, length of baseball experience, physical findings at the elbow, and elbow pain.
Methods: In 2014, 720 fifth-grade baseball players from four regions in Japan were invited to participate in a questionnaire survey and undergo physical examination to obtain data on position played, length of baseball experience, presence of elbow pain, and physical findings at the elbow, including range of motion, tenderness, and valgus stress test results. Potential risk factors associated with elbow pain and correlations between physical findings and playing position, length of baseball experience, and elbow pain were investigated.
Results: The 720 subjects had a mean age of 10.4 years and 29.4% reported having experienced elbow pain for ≥1 week. Risk factors for elbow pain included playing pitcher and catcher, playing pitcher and fielder, and length of baseball experience. The most frequent finding was limitation of flexion (21.1%) followed by tenderness of the medial epicondyle (18.3%) and a positive valgus stress test (14.3%). These three findings were also significantly associated with elbow pain. Elbow extension was limited in 14.9% of subjects but there was no correlation with length of baseball experience or elbow pain.
Conclusions: Our data show that elementary school baseball players who experienced elbow pain are likely to have valgus stress overload. Elbow pain might be prevented by not playing pitcher and catcher.
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