Training Accidents

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[Dave Gallagher]

Early in my training in the mid 80's I remember hearing about someone becoming paralyzed by an accident in the dojo. If I remember correctly it involved two people falling to close to each other.
Having been away from training for a while I am wondering if anyone has heard of serious injuries from training over the years.

[Philip Hornback]

I haven't heard about any serious accidents like that, but I have been hit in the head by a jo once (minor cut), broken my small toe (got caught between the mats), and tore my medial meniscus (some how?) and I'm still training. All I can say is train slowly and with control, and you'll be fine.

[Dave Gallagher]

I am not having any problems (other than being over 60 years old) at this time.I had a bum knee but it's much better and I have gotten over my initial fear of ukemi upon my return after a long layoff.
My question is really about Aikido's history of (or lack of) serious injury to the neck or spinal core etc.

[Michael Hackett]

There have been previous discussions concerning injuries and deaths in Aikido here on AikiWeb. I know personally of one spinal injury in this region in the past couple of years. The injured party was taking her nidan exam and injured her neck during randori when she did a sudori and was accidently kneed (I believe) on the side of her neck. She remained conscious, but was paralyzed from the cervical spine down for a short while. She fully recovered after a couple of days in the hospital and is back training and teaching again. I don't think anything was broken, but suspect she just "shocked" the spinal cord when struck.

[Dave Gallagher]

I just noticed that core should have been cord. Anyway, you know what I meant.

[ninjaqutie]

I've really just heard of mostly minor and somewhat typical ma related injuries: whacked in head with bokken or jo, broken toes, jammed fingers, tweaked knees, shoulders or back and lots and lots of bruises.

[Tim Ruijs]

Aikido practise should be safe, but...it still is a martial art.

The techniques themselves, when practised sensibly, are not dangerous. The most danger occurs when people take ukemi and are not to aware of their surroundings. People may collide heads, legs swing around: you get the picture. This may inflict serious injury.
On the other hand working with weapons is also risky because of longer range, higher speed.

The worst injury I have witnessed on the tatami happened during koshinage. A good friend of mine was thrown by our teacher (at the time). Due to some miscommunication (there you have it!) he thought he would not be thrown, but the teacher in fact did. He tore three ligaments in his shoulder when he stretched out his arm in an attempt to stop the throw.:yuck:

[amoeba]

I've witnessed a girl somehow hitting her neck on nages knee while being thrown into a highfall. After that, she couldn't stand and was brought to the hospital. Luckily, she was fine again after two days or so, I don't know what kind of injury it actually was...

Otherwise... I've seen somebody hurt his hip quite badly getting stuck in nages hakama during a throw and a guy from our dojo hurt his knee tripping over his own hakama while running. Another guy was really unconcentrated during jiyu waza and tried to roll out of a pin, hurting his shoulder.

Luckily, I'm fine until now, though I managed to break a toe once just by standig up after a forward roll. No idea how I managed that...

[Carsten Möllering]

Here you have an article about and a listing of severe injuries and deadly incidents :
aikidojournal: Aikido and Injuries: Special Report, Fumiaki Shishida (http://www.aikidojournal.com/article?articleID=8&highlight=injuries)
At the buttom you will find a link to a list.

I myself never witnessed severe injury in the last 17 years. ...

[Hellis]

I remember a young guy many years ago during a ukemi session, as he did a forward breakfall with the palm of his hand touching the mat first - the palm of his hand split wide open - it was orrible.

Henry Ellis

British Aikido the Origins from 1955
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5pOv-0xaBI

[lbb]

I haven't personally witnessed anything that I'd call a serious injury: no shoulder dislocations, blown-out knees, not even a bad wrist sprain or twisted ankle, much less a spinal injury. I wasn't there for this, but there was one guy who got to playing too rough and ended up with a couple of cracked or broken ribs for his pains -- I think this was simply a case of "what you put out comes right back atcha", rather than any fault of his partner's -- and another guy who got a dislocated thumb -- he was working with a big strong beginner who didn't know better, and he (the guy with the thumb), also not very advanced, got a bit stubborn and failed to tap when he should have. But that's really all that I can remember.

[FiuzA]

In more than 15 years of practice I remember only one "serious" injury.

It was a kyu grade girl, in her fifteens, a bad mae ukemi (zempo kaiten) after being thrown which led to clavicle's injury (can't remember how bad it was, if broken or not).

Some time after though (couple months?) she recovered and began practice again. So, she was a tough girl :)

[Janet Rosen]

When I did my knee injury survey ten years ago, the query was for knee injuries severe enough for people to have lost time from training during the previous five years.
I received replies from 101 dojos representing 3250 people training. Fifty dojos reported NONE and among the other 51 dojos there were 99 acute knee injuries - on a per dojo basis, a 4.45% rate, on a per person basis, a 3% rate.
http://www.zanshinart.com/Essays/AikiKnee.html

Anecdotally, I know of at least a dozen people in various locations/styles of aikido who have had shoulder separations (acromioclavicular joint injury) MOSTLY during the first year of training in ukemi accidents + a couple in experienced students due to accidents in mid-fall like getting a toe caught in the hakama.

I was present at a seminar when somebody sustained a neck fracture, fortunately w/o cord damage. I know a couple of people who have had concussions.

[Jeremy Hulley]

I recieved a pretty serious concussion in 2001 and a friend had her orbit brken in 2004 or 5. Both pure accicents but pretty serious.

[Walter Martindale]

I've separated my acromio-clavicular (r) in practice early on. While taking ukemi once my heel scuffed another person's quadriceps and gave him a pretty serious bruise.

I've seen a few people thrown where their heads were VERY close to the ground when the body was going over - fortunately no contact or there's a broken neck...

[Shadowfax]

The Aikido Journal article is an eye opener.

I got a minor tear or severe sprain to the medial meniscus on my left knee last fall that kept me off the mat for a month and off my horse for two months. Took about six months to fully heal.

[ninjaqutie]

It was a kyu grade girl, in her fifteens, a bad mae ukemi (zempo kaiten) after being thrown which led to clavicle's injury (can't remember how bad it was, if broken or not).

Thanks for reminding me. One girl (yellow belt) in my previous aikijitsu class snapped her clavicle with a bad forward roll. She just collapsed her arm and came crashing down right onto it. She was out for a while, came back, couldn't get over her fear of getting hurt and ended up leaving. :(

[cguzik]

Early in my aikido career I spent some time training at a dojo with a teacher whose partner had been injured training at a seminar. I only heard about it indirectly but was told that she had been doing a backward roll and just at the point where her head and shoulder were down towards the mat, someone else had been thrown onto her and landed on her back, crushing her neck. She was paralyzed from the neck down. A freak accident, and a good reason to avoid backward rolls.

[cguzik]

Early in my aikido career I spent some time training at a dojo with a teacher whose partner had been injured training at a seminar. I only heard about it indirectly but was told that she had been doing a backward roll and just at the point where her head and shoulder were down towards the mat, someone else had been thrown onto her and landed on her back, crushing her neck. She was paralyzed from the neck down. A freak accident, and a good reason to avoid backward rolls.

Actually I think it was not a seminar, upon further recollection, but just a regular class.

[ninjaqutie]

A freak accident, and a good reason to avoid backward rolls.

Actually, we don't do backwards rolls in my dojo for that exact reason.

[Carsten Möllering]

A freak accident, and a good reason to avoid backward rolls.
We - normally - don't do backward rolls.

[Marie Noelle Fequiere]

Just getting out of bed in the morning puts you at risk of having an accident!
During my about twenty years of martial arts training, I've been injured several times - the last time was about three weeks ago -, I've always bounced back, and I have plenty of company.
Just put your gi on and start training.

[robin_jet_alt]

In about 10 years, I have either witnessed or known people who have experienced the following. Personally, the worst injury I have experienced came from playing catch, not Aikido.

Dislocated collarbone: inexperienced uke learning tobi-ukemi for the first time tried to pull out at the last minute

Separated shoulder: Very experienced uke thrown hard with kokyuu-nage aggravated an existing shoulder injury

Dislocated collarbone: Not at my dojo. A fairly experienced uke tried to pull out of a tobi-ukemi at the last minute (I see a pattern here)

Shattered 3rd and 4th metacarpals: Not at my dojo. A fairly experienced uke received kotegaeshi from his sensei and got his fingers caught in sensei's sleeve.

[philipsmith]

here's some research I did a couple of years ago.

Might be helpful

http://jst.ucb.ac.uk/pdf/Volume2/Issue1/JST_Vol2_Issue1.pdf

[Eva Antonia]

Hi all,

I proudly announce that I'm far above Janet's statistics, having already had three aikido accidents :-), not counting falling on my head when trying mae & ushiro ukemi during my first year.

It's something like 1 accident per kyu grade.

6th kyu - too short period for having an accident
5th kyu - resisted sankyo and had something torn in my elbow. It hurt for three months, and that elbow is still a bit less flexible than before
4th kyu - rupture of anterior cruciate ligament due to awkward movemend as tori in yokomen uchi irimi nage (was operated & reconstructed, works even better than before)
3th kyu - was thrown in kaiten nage, caught my foot in tori's hakama and went vertically into the tatami, something crashed in my shoulder and hurt so much that I was breathless for some seconds. Shoulder hurt for several weeks and is still not 100 % in order.

We will see what the following kyu and dan grades have in reserve for me...

Apart from that I observed lots of accidents from others, like torn muscles (guy who hates warm-up), broken rib (beginner trying ukeimi in her second lesson!), dislocated shoulder (guy trying mae ukemi over a big bouncing ball), tendon problems in wrists (people resisting nikkyo)....I always thought it's part of the game. And no, we are not in a bone-breaking aiki-jutsu dojo, and the accidents I observed were not only in my dojo.

Best regards,

Eva

[DonMagee]

I'm going to warn you, I'd advise not clicking on this link. It is gruesome. However, this is supposedly a bjj injury http://twitpic.com/5hb1lf

[ninjaqutie]

Wow....