This week's links from MomsTeam.com, a website devoted to health and safety issues in youth sports:
- According to the National Athletic Trainers Association, proper management of acute spinal injuries on the athletic playing field is crucial, given that sports participation constitutes the second most common cause of spinal cord injuries for Americans age 30 and younger. The NATA's position statement provides detailed guidelines for the immediate treatment and transport of athletes who are injured on the playing field. Sports medicine providers and others on the sidelines need to be familiar, says the NATA, with the appropriate acute-management guidelines for athletes with cervical-spine injuries.
- There is still confusion about the recent positions taken by NOCSAE over the past month over helmet certification, first deciding that the certification of any helmet with a third-party add-on would be viewed as automatically void. Last week, NOCSAE made a 180-degree turn and left it up to the helmet manufacturers to decide whether affixing impact sensors to the inside or outside of a helmet voided the certification. The controversy has MomsTeam's Brooke de Lench scratching her head, wondering what is going on, as she discussed in her latest blog.
- There is new evidence to suggest that new limits imposed last year by Pop Warner to reduce contact during practices is having the desired effect: less exposure in practice to head injuries among young football players and the kind of repetitive subconcussive blows that some researchers suggest can lead to long-term brain injury. A new study by researchers at Virginia Tech-Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center shows no increase in concussions following these guidelines.
- In another in MomsTeam's series of concussion education videos, Dr. William P. Meehan III, director of the Sports Concussion Clinic and the Micheli Center for Sports Injury Prevention in the Division of Sports Medicine at Children's Hospital Boston, discussed the many factors an athlete and his or her family should consider in deciding whether to retire from after multiple concussions.
- Management of sport-related concussion involves a step-by-step process beginning before a sports season even starts, say the three newest concussion guidelines. That process continues through on-the-field evaluation, sideline assessment, diagnosis, treatment, and return to play. MomsTeam's Senior Health and Safety Editor Lindsay Barton provided a comprehensive review of the latest expert thinking on concussion management.
-- MomsTeam.com and NFLEvolution.com