Australian Army recruit training: course length and recruit injury rates

Question:
Does the length of a recruit training program influence
injury rates?
Design:
Retrospective cohort study. Data were recorded within a oneyear
period during two different Army recruit training course types – the
Australian Recruit 80 day Course (ARC), and the Australian Soldier 100 day
Course (ASC).
Participants:
Participants were 267 Australian Regular Army recruits
undertaking Basic Training in 2013 (ARC n=194: ASC n=73).
Intervention: Exposure to Army recruit training programs of varying
lengths, with minimal other differences.
Outcome Measures:
Reported rates, types and mechanisms of injuries
were collected. Rates included injury prevalence (number of reported
injuries/number of personnel completing respective course x100) and
injury incidence (number of injuries/100 recruits completing the respective
course/course length in days x 100).
Results: Injury prevalence for ASC recruits was 17.8% and for ARC recruits
13.9%. Injury incidence for the ASC and ARC were 17.8 injuries and 17.4
injuries /100 soldiers/100 days respectively. While the majority of injuries
for both courses were sprains and strains, the leading mechanisms of
injury differed.
Conclusions: Longer, less intensive recruit training programs may be
associated with similar rates of injury per unit time as shorter, more
intensive programs. As such, greater proportions of recruits may be injured
across longer programs.
Key Practice Points:
• Lengthening a recruit training program with the aim of making it less
intensive may not reduce the proportion of recruits injured – in fact,
a higher proportion is likely to be injured due to the longer period of
exposure to training.