With concussion safeguards, fewer high school players 'see stars'
Dan Sostek
Chambersburg Public Opinion
For years, the word "concussion" wasn't a part of the football lexicon. Players "got their bell rung" or "saw stars," often returning to the game without any concern for what was going on inside their cranium.
Now, at every level of the sport, including high school, that mindset has been flipped on its head. Concussions are now the large shadow looming over the game, with everyone involved doing everything in their power to limit them as much as possible.
Chastity Johnson, who worked as the coordinator of sports medicine for Chambersburg Area School District from 2006-16, has seen this trend develop.
"(There's been) a great deal of change in what we know," Johnson said. "Which has really changed how we approach evaluating (concussions) and managing them. And a lot of that change has come more so in how we care for them."
One of those changes is the specificity of directions given to deal with concussions. Johnson said instructions for returning from the injury used to be much more vague, as players could return once symptoms, such as headaches, subsided.
Now, athletes have to pass baseline concussion tests, known as ImPACT tests, which analyze how the brain is working in terms of memory, reaction time and other brain functions.
"We're seeing a lot more awareness that the brain takes a while to recover," Johnson said.
Coaches who played the game in a much different era have noticed changes.
"When I played, it was just, 'Oh, I got my bell rung, I'm all right.' I never wanted to come off for anything," Waynesboro head coach Steve Myers said. "Now there's a lot more awareness about it. ... Obviously, it's a good thing."
Johnson saw that development accelerated a bit, as two separate athletes suffered serious brain injuries resulting in brain bleeds while participating in sports in 2009.
Due to a push by the local community for better care, the district received a grant from ImPACT to start implementing their testing, giving the Trojans a leg up on other schools in terms of concussion testing. Many schools started implementing the tests years later.
While it's unfortunate that it took serious injuries to get the community behind them, Johnson says that seems to be an ugly truth of the public's understanding of brain injuries.
"There's still this mentality of, 'It's a man's sport, we need to toughen up our kids.'" Johnson said. "It isn't taken as seriously in the general community as it needs to be."
She also thinks that concussions in high school athletics don't get as much media coverage as they should, with major stories only when a player dies on the field.
The state government has made a concerted effort to help.
Pennsylvania mandated coaches (in all sports, not just football) undergo training required by the Safety in Youth Sports Act, which Gov.Tom Corbett signed in 2011.
The bill established standards for concussion handling, including not permitting a player to return to practice until cleared by a medical professional.
It also requires that every coach take a course taught by a group approved by the Department of Health to teach coaches how to properly recognize symptoms and deal with concussion injuries in practice and in games.
The restrictions and limitations of a diagnosed concussion are obviously new to these coaches, as almost all of them grew up playing the sport without these limits.
But they understand that safety takes precedence and know that matters as grave as neurological damage should be deferred to experts.
"We want to play hard, we want to play fast, we want to play physical, but we want to do it in a safe manner," Chambersburg head football coach Mark Luther said. "I'm not a medical professional. If our medical staff says that's the way it is, then that's the way it is."
At the end of the day, the incidence rate will never be at zero. As long as there are sports that involve even a shred of physicality, head injuries will always be a risk.
The goal, Johnson notes, is simply to shrink that risk as small as anyone possibly can.
"We are never going to be rid of concussions, they're always going to happen," Johnson said. "But there are steps we can take to prevent them or minimize their impact."