Jersey schools prepare to implement new concussion law
As football season gets under way, so does a new state law
requiring school districts in New Jersey to stress concussion
prevention and make sure that injured athletes do not return to
their sport until they have healed.
Implementation begins Thursday.
The legislation, signed into law by Gov. Chris Christie in
December, requires that:
Every school district and charter and non-public school develop
“a written policy describing the prevention and treatment of
sports-related concussion and other head injuries sustained by
interscholastic student-athletes.”
All coaches, athletic trainers, school nurses and school/team
physicians complete an Interscholastic Head Injury Safety Training
Program by this school year.
Any student-athlete who participates in an interscholastic
sports program and is suspected of sustaining a concussion be
removed immediately from competition or practice. The injured
student will not be allowed to return to the sport until he or she
has written clearance from a physician trained in concussion
treatment and has completed the district’s graduated return-to-play
protocol.
A New Jersey Department of Education “Concussion and Head
Injury” fact sheet be distributed to athletes, and the district
obtain a signed acknowledgment from the student and his or her
parent/guardian.
A concussion — “a traumatic brain injury caused by a direct or
indirect blow to the head or body,” according to the New Jersey law
— can have long-lasting consequences for an athlete who sustains
one.
As part of the new law, the state recommends that school
districts do “preseason baseline testing” of students to determine
their neurological skills before a possible brain injury
occurs.
Some schools are using a testing service called ImPACT, or
Immediate Post-concussion Assessment and Cognitive Testing. It
gives a baseline assessment of a student’s memory, reaction time
and concentration, which can be compared with a test given
immediately after an injury to determine if the student has
sustained damage to his or her brain.
This month, Dick’s Sporting Goods has launched a Protecting
Athletes Through Concussion Education program to offer a free
one-year subscription for the ImPACT testing program to the first
3,335 high schools and middle schools that sign up for the $500
software package.
At school districts throughout Burlington County, education
officials are busy preparing to implement the state policy, which
in many cases is stressing policies the districts already had in
place.
For example, the Lenape Regional High School District — with an
enrollment of 7,500 students in four high schools — last year
started requiring students to undergo neurological testing before
they begin playing a sport using the ImPACT system to determine
their baseline neurological assessment.
If an athlete sustains a head injury in a game or at practice,
he or she is assessed by a coach or trainer immediately after the
injury for headache, nausea or other symptoms of a concussion.
“If they have any signs or symptoms, we hold them out,” said
Bill Von Leer, head athletic trainer at Lenape High School in
Medford, and they are referred to a physician.
An ImPACT reassessment is administered within a day or two to
make sure there are no cognitive changes.
“You don’t play through the pain with a head injury. It’s not
acceptable anymore,” said Carol Birnbaum, assistant superintendent
of the Lenape district, where 50 to 60 percent of the students play
a sport.
The Lenape district also has developed a taped round-table
expert discussion about concussions that can be viewed by parents
on its website, http://www.lrhsd.org/lenape/site/default.asp. The
round-table will be aired on the district’s television station,
available to both Comcast and Verizon subscribers.
Mark Cherwony, athletic trainer and assistant athletic director
for the Cinnaminson School District, said the district had received
a state grant to fund neurological testing in previous years and is
considering options for funding for this year.
“Every year before practice, I give a lecture about
concussions,” Cherwony explained, saying all student athletes are
required to attend the session.
Information on head injuries is also sent home with
students.
This year, per the new law, Cinnaminson coaches will take part
in an online program on concussions. A free version will be
available for viewing by students and their parents, Cherwony
said.
“We were really fortunate last year,” he said, because there
were a total of just seven high school concussions in the fall and
only two in the winter.
Invisible injury
The human brain is a soft organ protected by a hard skull.
Normally, the fluid around the brain protects the organ from
banging into the skull, but if the head or body is hit hard enough,
the brain can shift, resulting in injury.
The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates
that emergency rooms annually treat 135,000 sports- and
recreation-related traumatic brain injuries, including concussions,
among children ages 5 to 18.
Any sport involving a high rate of movement and sudden stops can
result in a concussion. Most — 80 percent to 90 percent — are
considered mild, meaning the person did not lose consciousness,
according to the CDC.
But a mild concussion is a potentially serious injury that, if
not treated properly, can result in brain damage, doctors
emphasize.
Emerging research suggests that an athlete who has a concussion
is more susceptible to a second one, and some studies have
connected repeated concussion injuries with depression, Parkinson’s
disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou
Gehrig’s disease.
The greatest health risk is second-impact syndrome, which
carries a high risk of death and permanent brain damage. It occurs
when the brain has not adequately healed from an initial concussion
and an athlete returns to play and sustains another concussion.
Kids today are physically larger than in previous generations,
which creates a higher risk for concussions during contact sports
and play, said Dr. Raymond Talucci, director of trauma services at
St. Mary Medical Center in Langhorne, Pa.
“These hits can be quite violent at times,” Talucci said.
A delay in diagnosis can occur because a diagnostic imaging scan
may not show any immediate brain damage, although symptoms emerge
later. This is the reason why observing how a person behaves and
functions after a head blow is a better indicator of a concussion,
Talucci said.
“If the CT is negative, it does not mean the child is not
injured,” he emphasized. “If a kid has a bad-enough injury to
require a CT, he’s in trouble.”
The federal government is looking into ways to help families
affected by brain injuries.
Congressman Jon Runyan, R-3rd of Mount Laurel, has co-sponsored
bipartisan legislation, HR 2600 — the National Pediatric Acquired
Brain Injury Plan Act — to “ensure that care is universally
accessible for the millions of families who have a child or young
adult suffering from a brain injury.”
“As a former professional athlete, I have long advocated for
better understanding of the consequences of head trauma,” Runyan
stated. “The damages from brain injury affect more than those who
suffer from it directly.”
The proposed federal legislation, if enacted, would create a
national network of state centers of excellence to help students
with sports-related injuries by providing information and resources
for them and their families.
For more information on concussions and head injuries, the New
Jersey law suggests visiting the CDC’s website at
www.cdc.gov/concussions/sports/index.html or the NCAA’s website at
www.ncaa.org/health-safety.
Von Leer said the best attributes of the new state law is that
it stresses to parents and students what can happen if a child is
injured, and the importance of making sure they return to school
not just as a healthy athlete but, more important, a healthy
student.
“I think just the overall education of this helps,” he said.
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