Epidemiologic analysis of injury in five years of Canadian professional rodeo.

Longitudinal studies of rodeo injuries are rare. We prospectively investigated injuries in professional rodeo in Canada over a 5-year period. Our specific interests included injury incidence density in specific rodeo events, risk factors such as past injury, and the incidence of head injury. Of 323 professional rodeos from 1995 through 1999, 63 rodeos provided a convenience sample. These rodeos were selected because the Canadian Professional Rodeo Sport Medicine Team was in attendance at these events, thus providing both competitor health care and data collection. Four hundred fifty-one injuries were reported during 30,564 competitor-exposures. The greatest injury frequency and injury incidence density were in the rough stock events (bull riding, bareback riding, and saddle bronc). Bull riding accounted for the greatest injury frequency (141) and incidence density (32.2 injuries per 1000 competitor-exposures). Bull riding had a relative injury risk of 1.32 when compared with bareback riding; bareback riding had a relative injury risk of 1.39 when compared with saddle bronc riding. Concussions accounted for 8.6% of all reported injuries. Concussions and other head injuries (65) were second only to knee injuries (76) in frequency of injury to specific body parts. This concussion frequency is higher than has previously been reported.