Psychological Interventions of Injury in Athletes A Review

Abstract

INJURY is one of the worst nightmares of any athlete. With increasing attention given to the development and implementation of psychological interventions during the sport injury rehabilitation process, there is a need to understand the effectiveness of these interventions. The purpose of this review is to summarize the empirical findings of the effects of psychological interventions in reducing post-injury psychological consequences and improving psychological coping during the injury rehabilitation process among competitive and recreational athletes.  Post injury psychological consequences can be coped up with many processes like, visual imagery, relaxation, self talk, goal setting, counseling, social support and many more. In this review we will come across the psychological response to injury and its reaction of the athletes. Surgery is often the result of sports injury and is routinely followed by a rehabilitation plan. This plan usually includes physical therapy and focuses on the return of mobility and function of the injured anatomical structure (Rodriguez et al., 2019). Athletic trainers are usually not properly trained on the psychological aspects of injury recovery (Bennett et al., 2016). The use of such psychological interventions is thought to have a positive impact on recovery efficiency and how effectively athletes return to play. As sports injury is a part of games and sports athletes have to accept it and take the risk of it every day to become successful in their career. They have to be ready for the consequences that are to come in the future if injury takes place but all now they can do is be careful and as much as possible protect themselves from injury by taking proper rest, having good diet, not over training and wearing proper equipments etc.