Athletic Taping and Bracing

The premier text for athletic taping and bracing is now revised in a stunning third edition. Athletic Taping and Bracing retains its emphasis on the techniques most commonly used by athletic trainers and therapists while integrating the science of anatomy and injury mechanisms with the practice of athletic taping and bracing. Plus, the third edition expands on traditional taping by including methods for rigid strap taping and elastic kinesiology taping.

Athletic Taping and Bracing, Third Edition, includes more than 480 full-color illustrations and photos, providing invaluable visual aids for both students and professionals. These include superb three-dimensional anatomical images from Primal Pictures. The photos that depict taping sequences feature tape with darkened edges that enable readers to distinguish the layers and patterns of the tape applied in each step.

With its concise anatomical descriptions and detailed anatomical illustrations similar to those normally found in advanced texts on anatomy, the book clearly highlights the mechanisms of injury that are crucial for understanding effective taping and bracing. The text thoroughly discusses and illustrates the general principles of taping and bracing for each major joint and body region. The third edition adds step-by-step instructions for 10 additional techniques, including elastic kinesiology taping and rigid strap taping techniques for gastrocnemius strains, Achilles tendinitis, and arch problems; knee, quadriceps, and hip problems; shoulder and elbow hyperextension laxity; epicondylitis; and wrist and hand issues. The book also features newly added instructor resources consisting of an image bank and testing checklists to help students master the taping procedures.

The text covers the 46 most frequently applied taping and bracing procedures in clinical practice, some of which are broken down into as many as 16 steps. It illustrates procedures for fabricating protective pads and orthotics, and it details the dos and don’ts of taping and bracing. To emphasize rehabilitation as well as prevention, Athletic Taping and Bracing, Third Edition, also presents basic stretching and strengthening exercises for injury rehabilitation. These exercises, presented and illustrated for each body part, focus on flexibility, strength, and proprioception. Combined with the taping and bracing procedures, the exercises will help rehabilitated athletes maintain strength and flexibility and safely return to play.

With Athletic Taping and Bracing, Third Edition, readers will learn the evidence-based foundations and techniques of taping and bracing, as well as how taping and bracing can aid an athlete’s total rehabilitation. The coverage of rehabilitation exercises as well as prevention will help readers become more effective health care providers for athletes and other active people with musculoskeletal injuries and problems.

David H. Perrin, PhD, ATC, FNATA, is provost and executive vice chancellor and professor of kinesiology at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, where he previously served as dean of the School of Health and Human Performance. Before going to Greensboro, Perrin directed the athletic training education program at the University of Virginia from 1986 to 2001. His awards from the National Athletic Trainers’ Association include the Sayers “Bud” Miller Distinguished Educator Award, the Most Distinguished Athletic Trainer Award, the William G. Clancy Medal for Distinguished Athletic Training Research, and induction into the NATA Hall of Fame.

Perrin is a fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine and a fellow of the American Academy of Kinesiology and Physical Education. For 13 years, he was also a member of the NATA Professional Education Committee, helping to write the guidelines for accreditation of both undergraduate and graduate athletic training education programs. In 2011, Perrin was elected a fellow of the National Athletic Trainers’ Association. He was editor in chief of the Journal of Athletic Training from 1996 to 2004 and was the founding editor of the Journal of Sport Rehabilitation. He is author of Isokinetic Exercise and Assessment and Athletic Taping and Bracing, editor of the third edition of The Injured Athlete, and coauthor of Research Methods in Athletic Training.

In his free time, Perrin enjoys traveling, exercising, and vacationing at his lake cottage in Vermont.