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Pickleball is sending more people to the ER than it used to

The fastest-growing sport in America skews heavily toward this exact age group — and so do the injuries. The numbers, and what the research says actually reduces the risk.

By Edward Silva · 5 minute read · Verified against NEISS-based research

Pickleball’s growth has been hard to miss — new courts, retiree leagues, a court repainted at the local park almost every season. What gets less coverage is the other number that grew alongside it: emergency room visits for pickleball injuries, concentrated overwhelmingly in players 50 and older.

The numbers
The ER trendEstimated pickleball-related ER visits rose from about 8,300 in 2018 to more than 31,000 in 2025, based on analyses of the federal injury-surveillance data (NEISS) hospitals report from.
Who is actually getting hurtAdults 50 and older accounted for more than 4 in 5 of the roughly 125,000 pickleball ER visits recorded from 2018 through 2025. Half of those were players 65 and older.
What actually causes the injuriesFalls, trips and slips account for nearly half of all pickleball ER visits in the same 2018–2025 analysis. A separate, earlier study focused specifically on seniors (60+, 2010–2019) found the leading diagnoses among that group were strains and sprains (33.2%) and fractures (28.1%).
A gender gap in fracture riskIn that same senior-specific 2010–2019 study, women 60+ were 3.7 times more likely than men 60+ to suffer a fracture, and 9.3 times more likely to suffer a wrist fracture specifically.

Why this sport, and why this age group

Pickleball asks for something tennis and golf mostly don’t: short, hard bursts of lateral movement and quick direction changes on a small court, from a standing start, often after years away from any racquet sport. That combination — sudden pivots, a compact playing surface, players returning to activity after a long gap — is exactly the pattern behind most of the fall-related injuries in the data above. It is a genuinely good source of cardiovascular activity and, for many people in this age range, some of the only regular exercise they get. The injury pattern is not a reason to stop playing; it is a reason to know what actually drives it.

Popularity explains part of the surge in injuries. It does not explain why older players make up such a lopsided share of them — that part is about the sport itself, and who is playing it.

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What tends to reduce the risk

Sports-medicine guidance for older recreational players who take up a new racquet sport commonly emphasizes the same handful of things: a proper warm-up, footwear built for lateral movement rather than running, and building up intensity gradually rather than playing at full pace from the first match. None of this is specific research about pickleball’s exact injury mechanisms — it is the general standard for this kind of activity, applied to a sport that happens to fit the pattern closely.

  • Court shoes built for lateral support are the standard recommendation over running shoes, which are built to grip going forward rather than stop side to side.
  • A proper warm-up before playing, especially first thing in the morning or after sitting for a while, is standard sports-medicine advice for racquet sports generally.
  • The fracture-risk gap between men and women 60+ in the data above is specific enough that it is worth knowing about, whatever you and your doctor already discuss about bone health.
  • Falls, not overuse, drive most of these injuries — a bad step or a hard pivot, not gradual wear. That is why footwear and warm-up matter more here than in a lot of other exercise.

None of this is a reason to trade pickleball for the couch. The data above says something more specific: this particular sport, played by this particular age group, has a real and rising injury count behind the fun of it — worth knowing, not worth avoiding.

This is general information, not personal advice. We report the rules, the numbers and the deadlines as clearly as we can. We don't know your income, your state, your health or your family — and all four can change the answer. Treat this as a good place to find the right questions, not a substitute for someone looking at your actual situation.

Where these facts come from

Checked on 29 August 2026 against the sources listed below. Dollar limits and program rules change — if you're reading this well after that date, verify the numbers at the links below.

Edward Silva

Edward Silva

Edward spent more than forty years as a computer professional — long enough to pick up one useful occupational habit: when somebody hands you a summary, go and read the actual documentation. He started The Second Half Guide after noticing that most writing aimed at people his age was either talking down to him or quietly selling him something, and that the plain facts — the dates, the thresholds, the dollar figures — were somehow the hardest part to find.

He's married, with two grown sons, both married themselves. He is not a financial adviser, an attorney or an insurance agent, and this site doesn't tell you what to do with your money. It tells you what the rules actually say, and links to where he checked.

Next up

Falls: the numbers, and what actually reduces them

The same question asked about falls generally, not just on the pickleball court.

Read it →
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