title: Anterior cruciate ligament injury in professional dancers.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Anterior cruciate ligament injury (ACL) is a common sport injury; however, there are no data concerning dance and ACL injury. We report the incidence, injury mechanism, and clinical follow-up of ACL injury in professional dancers.
  
  
  METHODS
  In a retrospective cohort study involving the three major dance companies in the Netherlands, by interviewing all 253 dancers who had had a full-time contract during 1991-2002, dancers with symptomatic ACL injury or past ACL reconstruction were identified and examined.
  
  
  RESULTS
  6 dancers (2 of whom were women) had had a symptomatic ACL rupture and reconstruction. Interestingly, all had been on the left side and had had a similar trauma mechanism: while dancing a classical variation they landed, after a jump, on their left leg, in the turned out position with a valgus force on their knee. There was a higher risk of ACL injury in the classical company than in the two contemporary companies. The risk of dancers having a rupture of the left ACL during a 10-year career in this classical company was 7%.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  ACL injuries are not an infrequently seen type of injury in professional classical dancers, with a very specific mechanism of injury--a landing on the left leg in exorotation. More attention and prophylactic measures should be given to this specific injury mechanism.
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedics, Erasmus MC, University Medical Center Rotterdam, The Netherlands. d.meuffels@erasmusmc.nl
authors.forename: Duncan E
authors.initials: DE
authors.lastname: Meuffels
authors.forename: Jan A N
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Verhaar