Developing ahealth surveillance strategyfor professional footballers incompliance withUK health andsafety legislation

The needforhealthsurveillance for professional footballers hasbeenassessed against criteria specified inUK health and safety legislation. As footballers suffer fromchronic injuries undernormalplayingconditions, professional football clubs havearequirement toimplement health surveillance programmestoprotect their players. A healthsurveillance programme,basedonbenchmarking aplayer'sfitness andaddressing theissues of pre-recruitment, pre-season, duringseason,post-season, and rehabilitation assessment, isproposed. (BrJ_ Sports Med1997;31:148-149)