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Do Mouth-Formed Mouth Guards Meet the NCAA Rules?
The Physician and Sportsmedicine
|July 28, 2016
Summary
Most mouth-formed mouthguards do not meet National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) rules for football players, especially for athletes of color. Even the largest tested mouthguard failed to meet NCAA standards for most players on a predominantly black team.
Area of Science:
- Sports Medicine
- Biomechanics
- Orthodontics
Background:
- Mouthguards are essential protective equipment in contact sports like football.
- National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) rules mandate specific dimensions for mouthguards to ensure player safety.
- Previous research has not comprehensively assessed the fit of commercially available mouthguards against NCAA standards, particularly across diverse athletic populations.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the conformity of 12 types of mouth-formed mouthguards to NCAA rules.
- To compare the maxillary arch lengths of university football players with mouthguard dimensions.
- To identify potential disparities in mouthguard fit among different racial groups within the football player population.
Main Methods:
- Measurement of maxillary arch lengths from dental casts of 413 university football players.
- Comparison of measured arch lengths with the dimensions of 12 commercially available mouth-formed mouthguards.
- Statistical analysis to determine the percentage of mouthguards meeting NCAA rules and to compare mean arch lengths between racial groups.
Main Results:
- A significant proportion of university football players have maxillary arch lengths exceeding the dimensions of currently available mouth-formed mouthguards.
- The largest tested mouthguard met NCAA rules for only 5.5% of players on a predominantly black team.
- Black athletes exhibited a significantly larger mean maxillary arch length compared to racially mixed athletes.
Conclusions:
- Current mouth-formed mouthguards are inadequately sized for a substantial number of university football players, failing to meet NCAA safety regulations.
- There is a need for mouthguard manufacturers to develop larger sizes to accommodate the diverse anatomical variations, particularly among black athletes.
- Inadequate mouthguard fit poses a potential risk to player safety, highlighting the importance of adhering to and potentially revising NCAA equipment standards.
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