The ACL is one of the most commonly injured ligaments of the knee. This injury occurs in certain sports – especially soccer, basketball, lacrosse and volleyball – that require quick turns and hard, abrupt landings. 70 percent of ACL injuries occur through non-contact mechanisms, while 30 percent result from direct contact with another player or object. There are multiple factors that explain why women are more prone to ACL injuries. These risk factors include: anatomical, hormonal and neuromechanical factors. Women have greater anterior pelvic tilt, hip anteversion, tibiofemoral angle, and quadriceps angle than men. The risk of suffering an ACL disruption is greater during the preovulatory phase of the cycle than during the postovulatory phase. Females typically display a more erect and valgus posture when contacting the ground during the early stages of deceleration tasks. Intervention programs have been done to reduce the incidence of ACL injuries; they are composed of: plyometrics trainings, proprioception trainings, and core stabilization and resistance trainings. Although these results are promising, ACL injury rates and the associated sex disparity have not yet diminished. The presence of altered movement patterns may be responsible for the increased rates of knee injury in females, but is not typically measured in athletes prior to participation. No method for the accurate and practical screening and identification of athletes at increased risk of ACL injury is currently available. Preparticipation screening of athletes may be used to identify those athletes prone to knee injury and who would benefit from a training intervention to enhance strength, proprioception, and neuromuscular stabilization about the knee joint.
