Advanced applications of backward design: Crafting holistic and athlete-centered injury rehabilitation plans

There remains a pressing need to enhance sports rehabilitation practices due to several ongoing challenges like increasing re-injury rates. By encouraging practitioners to begin with the end in mind, a backward design approach can help create more comprehensive and sport-specific rehabilitation programs that better support athletes' return-to-sport outcomes. However, there is a lack of clear and actionable guidance for applying backward design approaches in more advanced scenarios like when rehabilitating complex injuries in highly dynamic and unpredictable sporting contexts. Through three highly prevalent use cases, this article will address this critical gap by highlighting the modularity of backward design approaches, and offer practical and step-by-step strategies for practitioners looking for solutions in these contexts.