UEFA Medical Podcast

I welcome Dale Forsdyke in this episode, who has published extensively on psychological readiness and injury. We discuss the complexities of sports injuries—beyond the physical—uncovering the psychological and cognitive factors that play a critical role in injury prevention and rehabilitation. We hope today’s discussion offered practical takeaways. Remember, behind every injury is a whole person—and understanding that can make all the difference.

This episode explores the technical aspects of heading in football, its differences between men and women, and its importance for player safety. We’ll be talking with Kerry Peek, a leading researcher on this topic who recently compared men’s and women’s heading techniques in a publication in BMJ Open SEM. We’ve highlighted practical insights to improve heading techniques, coaching strategies, and player safety. Key takeaways include skill development, protective techniques, and fostering communication between coaches, players, and support staff. By implementing these, we can make the game safer and more effective. The complete study is free to access here.Reference: Kerry Peek, Julia Georgieva, Andreas Serner, Filip Orest - Differences in the technical performance of heading between men and women football players during FIFA World Cup 2022 and FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 matches: BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine 2024;10:e002066.

Welcome to the UEFA Medical Podcast! Today, we’re chatting with Ulrika Tranaeus about the connection between mental health and sports injuries.We dive into some practical tips from a study she led, discussing the importance of communication and holistic approaches to injury prevention and rehab.Our conversation is based on a recent scientific publication by Ulrika and colleagues.Tranaeus, et al. 50 Years of Research on the Psychology of Sport Injury: A Consensus Statement. Sports Med 54, 1733–1748 (2024).This article is free to read via this linkThanks for joining us on the UEFA Medical Podcast! If you liked this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share it with others who might find it helpful. Stay tuned for more! Until next time.

Our March UEFA Medical webinar was dedicated to menstrual health in football players. This is a significant area of focus for us, and we are in the process of developing a UEFA consensus on this issue. We are also creating practical tools and research guidelines to support this initiative. In this podcast, we aim to delve deeper into the tracking of menstrual health and ongoing research. We have invited Kirsty Sale, a key member of our upcoming guideline panel, to facilitate this discussion.

Our most recent webinar comprehensively explored tournament preparations and player well-being. With EURO2024 in mind, we invited Greg Dupont and Tomislav Vlahovic to share their stories and lessons learned from their experiences with men’s teams. To provide a balanced perspective, we also had the privilege of hearing from Rita Tomas, the doctor of the Portuguese women’s team.

This month’s UEFA Medical webinar highlighted menstrual health in football players, and we were presented with the clinical and scientific side of some cases. In this podcast, we want to follow this up and dig a little deeper into the clinical aspects of menstrual health, and for this, we invited Emma Paternotte.

Last month, our webinar focused on concussions in football. We hosted Claus Reinsberger and Edwin Goedhart, who shared their scientific and practical insights on concussion management. You can still rewatch this webinar on our YouTube channel through this link.  In this podcast, we dig a little deeper and focus on the latest iteration of the Sports Concussion Assessment Tool (the SCAT 6) and how this tool can be applied in football. Who else to guide us through this than Jon Patricians, board member of the concussion in sports group.Jon shared a lot of information.  Here are the links to the scientific documents he mentioned. All documents are free to access.Sport Concussion Assessment Tool 6 (SCAT6)What is new in the SCAT6?Consensus statement on concussion in sportConcussion in para sport

In January, we hosted our first UEFA Medical webinar .. kicking off with the topic “Sudden Cardiac Arrest” in football. We know one hour is not enough to dive into all aspects of this topic. That is why, in this podcast, I talk with Dr Harald Jorstad, who explains more about the value of screening to prevent Sudden Cardiac Arrest ... some myths and thoughts about what is on the horizon. 

Last month, we hosted our first medical webinar .. kicking off with the topic “Sudden Cardiac Arrest” in football. We are aware one hour is not enough to dive into all aspects of this topic. That is why, in this podcast, I talk with Tim Meyer, who explains us more on the value of the Sudden Cardiac Arrest registries.