Young people urged to take it easy with sport
Too much sport can be damaging for teenagers, a leading surgeon has warned.
Patrick Carton, a hip consultant at Waterford’s Whitfield clinic, has revealed he has been operating on 10 patients a week with hip problems caused by arduous training regimes.
Some of these patients have been as young as 15, though the average age is 26. Excessive movement can cause deforming tears in hips’ seals, he revealed, in research published in the Clinical Journal of Sports Injuries noting that lunging and squats are often difficult for athletes with such damage.
Advising that teenagers should focus on one sport and train lightly, rather than risking overtraining through a range of sports that can take a toll on the hips, he cautioned that female hips are more susceptible to sports-related damage than male ones, and warned that stiffness in the hips after exercise, perhaps accompanied by groin pain, is usually a clue that something is amiss.
Monitor wins award
A breastfeeding monitor for new mothers, designed by a Dublin-based start-up, has won the ESB Spark of Genius award at the annual Web Summit.
The €25,000 prize, presented to Coroflo in Lisbon, rewards the creation of a hi-tech nipple shield, incorporating technology that monitors and measures milk flow from mother to baby and communicates its measurements with a smartphone app.
The inspiration for the device came in early 2015 when Coroflo founders Helen Barry and James Travers’ own baby son was born weighing just five pounds (2.27kg), making it especially important that they knew how much breast milk he was consuming.
The company is currently engaged in beta testing with new mothers, and aims to have product and app ready in the first half of 2018, with a planned Irish launch next September.
Mental health of young men under focus
A greater focus in needed on the mental health of young men, the chairperson of Tullamore’s Men’s Shed has said on International Men’s Day.
Noting how many young men struggle with physical and mental health, Tom Finnerty said: “I think we need to focus a little bit more from a younger age on their physical health, their wellness and to be aware of what is going on in their lives.”
With the majority of suicides in Ireland being men, Mr Finnerty said, it’s important to help build communities where men can look out for each other, describing how at Men’s Sheds – like the one in Tullamore – men can take part in projects, meet new friends or even just drink tea and play pool
“It’s a very informal setting,” he said. “There’s no pressure on anybody to do anything in the shed.”
