Playin soccer / particular tips?

Question

Dear expert team,

I am 28 years old and was diagnosed with CF at age 7 (delta F508/R347P), with a relatively mild progression so far. I have pseudomonas in my sputum frequently, and aspergillus every once in a while. At the end of last year, I had pancreatitis briefly (probably due to irregular intake of creon), but amylase, lipase, and CRP are normal again. My lung function is pretty good: VC 96%, FEV1 93%, PEF 139%. I am 183cm tall and weigh about 69/70kg.

I have always worked out a lot, although I switched from soccer to indoor sports and going to the gym a few years after the diagnosis. I am now considering going back to playing soccer regularly.

My questions:

1. Is soccer an advisable sport for people with CF like me?

2. Do you consider it a problem if I play soccer e.g. under wet conditions or in the cold?

3. Do you have any particular tips I should consider?

Many thanks and kind regards.

Answer

Hello,

we asked Corinna Moos-Thiele (certified sports scientist, German CF patient association) for an answer. She says the following:

“Dear sportsman,

First of all, it is very good that you exercise on a regular basis, and I would love to motivate you to keep playing your favourite sport. There is one important thing before you sign up for a club again: You should talk to your CF clinic and rule out any health limitations that would stand against doing contact sports. If the doctor, from a health perspective, gives you the go-ahead, nothing stands in the way of your plan.

As a general recommendation: If you enjoy playing soccer, I can recommend it. After all, it is important that you enjoy the exercise. Any additional exercise will have positive effects on the cardiovascular system, among other things. It also promotes motor skills and trains coordinative skills such as response. Apart from the physical effects, group exercise also supports mental balance. As a rule, one can say that systematic weight and endurance training complements team sports with their idea of competition in an ideal way, since systematic strengthening supports physical efficiency e.g. in soccer. In your case, this combination is present and I would strongly support it.

In cold and wet weather, there is an increased risk of catching a cold. However, in soccer there is a summer and winter season too, and in the winter people often switch to playing indoors, so that the risk of catching a cold is minimized. From a sports science perspective, the division into summer and winter training makes sense, since the risk of muscle, tendon, or ligament injuries is higher in cold temperatures. I.e., if you practise in the cold, you should by all means pay attention to warming up your muscles appropriately –which, however, is very hard to achieve in very cold temperatures. If you would like an individualized evaluation, you should again contact your CF doctor.

There are not many particular tips concerning sports if you have a trainer who will provide guidance. I always recommend informing the trainer about your particular health situation, but also explaining to him what CF is. If you do so, your trainer can react to specific situations and prevent particular risks if necessary.

I have two general tips, however: If you exercise on a regular basis, you will have an increased calorie consumption (due to the movement) and loss of salt (due to the sweating). You can compensate for the calorie consumption by increasing your food intake even during longer exercise times. Light and easily digestible food is good for this. Other than that, you should follow a high-calorie diet as usual. It is even more important to pay attention to the increased loss of salt during sweating and the resulting increased need for liquid, which can easily be compensated for by drinks rich in carbohydrates. A tip concerning this: when exercising up to 45 minutes in cool temperatures, it is sufficient to drink again after exercise. When exercising longer than that or in the heat, you should drink 200-300ml of liquid every 15-20 minutes. Fruit juice spritzer with a little extra salt (a pinch to half a teaspoon) is ideal.

All best,
Corinna Moos-Thiele, certified sports scientist, German CF patient association”

Kind regards,
Annette Pfalz for ECORN-CF

08.05.2012