Prescribing practices and interventions in elite football: Patterns and perspectives

Current practice trends in medical prescribing within elite football are relatively unknown with previous studies focusing on player-reported data. This paper aims to examine the utilisation and frequency of management strategies in elite football in the areas of analgesia, muscle injury intervention, bone injury, well-being and concussion management. An online survey was distributed to medical staff working within elite football. This included medical clinicians and non-medical prescribers. Anonymised data were transformed and analysed using SPSS v29. 126 completed surveys were eligible for inclusion. 81% worked for teams at National Tier One or above and 85% in the men’s game with 79% based in the UK. On average, 26% of prescriptions were due to clinician-perceived pressure to prescribe. Clinicians in the UK prescribe paracetamol and opiates more frequently (p