Football knee injuries likelier on turf than grass

College football players suffer knee injuries about 40 percent more often when playing on an artificial surface compared to when they're playing on grass, according to a new study. "We thought it was interesting because many universities are switching to the new generation artificial turf," said Dr. Jason Dragoo, the study's lead author and a professor at Stanford University School of Medicine. Dragoo said turf provides a more consistent playing field, and is expected to deliver better performance, but it has not been considered any less safe than grass. "This doesn't say there's conclusive evidence that turf increases the injury rate, but maybe we can say it's not as safe as we thought it was," Dragoo told Reuters Health.

The findings, published in The American Journal of Sports Medicine, were part of a study looking back on knee injuries among college football players to see when they might be most vulnerable to getting hurt