TY - JOUR PY - 2020// TI - Epidemiology and risk factors for heat illness: 11 years of heat stress monitoring programme data from the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour JO - British journal of sports medicine A1 - Racinais, Sebastien A1 - Alhammoud, Marine A1 - Nasir, Nada A1 - Bahr, Roald SP - ePub EP - ePub VL - ePub IS - ePub N2 - OBJECTIVES: To analyse 11 years of FIVB heat stress-monitoring data to determine the relative influence of the different environmental parameters in increasing the likelihood of a heat-related medical time-out (MTOheat). METHODS: A total of 8530 matches were recorded. The referee measured air temperature, black globe temperature, relative humidity and wet-bulb globe temperature (WBGT) before the matches, and registered the MTOheat. The absolute humidity was computed at posteriori. RESULTS: There were 20 MTOheat cases, but only 3 resulted in forfeiting the match. MTOheat incidence was not statistically impacted by sex (p=0.59). MTOheat cases were more prevalent during the games played in Asia during the 4th quarter of the year (p<0.001). Two cases of MTOheat experienced diarrhoea or gastroenteritis during the 5 preceding days; both of them forfeited the match. A principal component analysis showed a specific environmental profile for the matches with MTOheat. They occurred at higher WBGT, temperatures and absolute humidity (p<0.001), but with a lower relative humidity (p=0.027). CONCLUSIONS: The current data showed that an increase in ambient or black globe temperature, but not relative humidity, increased the risk of a MTOheat; but that the absolute risk remained low in elite beach volleyball players. However, suffering or recovering from a recent illness may represent a risk factor for a MTOheat to lead to player forfeit.

Language: en

LA - en SN - 0306-3674 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2020-103048 ID - ref1 ER -