For those MomsTeam readers in the Boston area, here's a chance to hear more about concussions in sports from one of the most knowledgeable experts in the area. 

At 5:30 p.m. on Monday, September 19th, MomsTeam concussion expert, William P. Meehan, III, will be talking about his new book, Kids, Sports, and Concussion, as part of the ReadBoston celebrity author series.

The event will  be held at the Hotel Commonwealth, 500 Commonwealth Avenue in Boston's Back Bay. Tickets are $30.  Complimentary wine and hors d'oevres will be served.

Advanced reservations can be made by e-mail (ReadBoston@cityofboston.gov) or by phone (617.918.5289). 

For more information about the event, click here.

Update: the event was a huge success.

Here's a picture of me, Dr. Meehan, and Boston mayor, Tom Mennino, taken at the event:

There has been a flurry of books in recent years about concussions in sports, an issue MomsTeam and I began covering in depth back in 2001, way before the crisis grabbed the attention of the media, politicians and the sports establishment. So, when I received a review copy of Throwaway Players: The Concussion Crisis from Pee Wee Football to the NFL by Gay Culverhouse, I was a bit skeptical that it could add anything new to the discussion.

I couldn't have been more wrong! I loved this book!

It is a must-read for parents for one simple reason: as former President of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers of the NFL, with a doctorate in special education and mental retardation, and as a woman and mother, Gay has a unique perspective on the concussion crisis in football.
Culverhouse offers an oftentimes painfully honest, up-close-and-personal glimpse into a world and a culture most of us have never seen: a place in which, for far too long, the lifelong damage that is inflicted on the brains and bodies of football players has been swept under the rug in the name of the big business of sports, in the name of entertainment not unlike, as she says in the book, the fights of gladiators at the Coliseum in ancient Rome.

The book contains poignant stories of NFL players she has known who have grown old before their time, suffering from early dementia and clueless to their surroundings after a career taking blows to the head. Gay talks about the sexism she encountered as a female executive in the male-dominated world of professional sports. She writes of athletes abusing their bodies with performance enhancing drugs, of testifying to Congress, of forming a non-profit organization to assist retired players in accessing NFL benefits.

Throwaway Players not only "shines the light on the underbelly of America's sport," but issues a clarion call to everyone involved in football, from the NFL to youth football, to make sports less violent and much safer.

Gay went to work for her father, Hugh, the original owner of the team, after she broke her back in an accident. She ended up staying ten years, the last three as president, until her father died and the team was sold.

Not surprisingly, she dedicates her book to the members of the Buccaneers teams from 1976 to 1994; her "extended family and the (her) reason to change the National Football League."

Don't kill football, just make it safer

Gay takes pains throughout the book to make clear that she "does not want to kill the game of football." Her goal, one that I share and have been advocating for as well for the past twenty years, is for there to come a day in the not-too-distant future, in which our sons, and their children, and their children's children, play a smart game of football; a world in which they aren't tempted to use performance enhancing drugs, one in which, after they hang up their helmets, they don't need, as is sadly the case with far too many, a drool bib because they suffer from early onset Alzheimer's or Parkinson's, dementia and or mind-dulling addictions; for football parents to make sure their sons develop secondary skills so they have a career after they leave the game.

Wisdom-Daughters

In a chapter of her brilliant book, A Woman's Book of Life, author Joan Borysenko, Ph.D  talks about women reaching a stage in their lives when they become  "wisdom-daughters," with the ability to create new integral cultures,  "continu[ing their] psychological and spiritual development as ... truth-teller[s] while calling both people and institutions to their highest potential.

This is exactly what Gay is doing: by shining the light on the concussion epidemic at all levels of football, from NFL to high school and youth football, Gay is calling these institutions to their highest potential. Proof that she is succeeding is in the pudding: as a result, in part, of her testimony before Congress and lobbying efforts, the NFL now requires that an independent neurologist be present on the sidelines of every NFL game.

In her Congressional testimony, Culverhouse says she "spoke of the injustices done to the players who were put back on the field with injuries. Players forced themselves to play with concussions. They knew their back-up wanted on the field. They had to hold onto their jobs. I described the players who were injected with pain killers in the locker rooms so they could continue after half time."

Gay had the rare opportunity to see it all up close. Like most mothers and grandmothers of young football players, Gay is concerned not just with their safety, but with the safety of every mother's child, young or old. She freely admits in her book that, as an executive of an NFL team, she saw many things she questioned, yet dared not discuss openly, especially since she was a woman in a male-dominated culture and her degree had nothing to do with football.

I wanted to know how she handled her own son's football playing. "He never played," she told me. "We would sit directly behind the team during the game. My kids saw the blood, heard the bones breaking, and it took care of itself. My son is anti-violent."

What Gay was saying in so many words was what we all now know all too well: that if a player somehow beats the odds by making it to the NFL as a linebacker, his career lasts, on average, only 2.7 years, and, because they need to play four seasons to get health insurance after they retire, most walk - or in most cases, limp - away from the game without the health insurance

Developing Secondary Skills

One of the most powerful stories in the book was about nine-year-old Nathan Fisher. When Nathan was still in grade school, his mom was already dreaming about how he would one day play for the Gators at the University of Florida and go on to star in the NFL so that, "when Nathan makes it big, I will get a new house and retire."

When we spoke last week, Gay lamented that parents like Nathan's see a possible pro sports career, as much of a long-shot as it is, as more important than getting a quality education and their only chance at the  "American dream." Gay's dream is that someday all kids who want to play will do so without fear of suffering lifelong injuries.

Culverhouse also talks about doing more to make sure athletes have the training and education to have careers outside of football after they retire. "The majority of NFL players do not have secondary skills they can turn to when their football days are done," she writes in Throwaway Players.

"These players, these men, had been thrown away after their years of gripping our hearts with their plays. What remained were the broken bodies and lost souls of the men who have permanently left the locker room. This is what remains after the cheering subsides. This is what the National Football League does not want you to see."

Shining the spotlight

Gay Culverhouse wants us to all to see. She wants us to question whether our society is any different from the ancient Romans, who thrived on violence. She wants us as parents of football players to question why and how we push our injured sons. Most of all she wants to keep shining a light on the crisis.

How I asked should kids take control? "I want them to put an "I" in the word TEAM. Only when kids start feeling their own pain, and start thinking about themselves and learn to self identify will the crisis end.

I wanted to know how or if the recent guidelines and fines that the NFL put into effect would be helpful in cutting down concussions and direct hits that are intended to cause harm. "The quarterbacks have a bull's eye on their backs," she said, and "whoever causes harm won't ever pay the fine. The team pays and it is all part of the cost to do business."

Culverhouse has been trying mightily to spread her message. She speaks to youth leagues, only to be told ‘"we had a medical doctor speak before and he scared the parents. You will scare parents away from letting their children play the game."

Gay tells me she does not want to turn youth and high school football into "flag football, with stricter rules and guidelines," but she does want parents to be educated to the point where they begin to demand rule changes, as has happened in the NFL.

To that end, Culverhouse will continue assisting retired NFL players in accessing benefits through the Gay Culverhouse Players Outreach Program, Inc. She is definitely the real deal. She is also helping us at MomsTeam to continue our eleven year mission of educating parents on the best ways to keep their kids safe and happy, and to that end she is sharing with MomsTeam viewers a concussion video that she has produced which I know you will find informative and will want to share with parents and coaches, and kids, too!

I have really been feeling the heat lately, both literally and figuratively.

It began when I travelled to the steambath that was Williamsburg, Virginia last weekend to give two talks to over 1,000 parents of some of the most elite high school football players in the nation attending a four-day training camp, and the heat didn't let up when I returned to my office this week.

The heat index in Virginia was almost off the charts. By day three the heat index had peaked at 123 degrees F. The temperature on the artificial turf fields where the kids were practicing and playing was, of course, even higher, reaching 144 at one point. This truly was no place for a youth sport health and safety advocate like me to be standing (although not for long; after standing on the sidelines for 15 minutes, I retreated to the safety and comfort of an air conditioned car and hotel lobby).

Or maybe it was.

To be honest, I had given serious thought to cancelling my trip because, as one who has consistently advised sports parents visiting MomsTeam to cancel or modify youth sports practices and games when the heat index is dangerously high, as I knew it would be last weekend in Virginia, I didn't want to be seen as giving the thumbs up to exactly that; in other words, to talking the talk, but not walking the walk.

But I ended up going in part because I was interested in hearing from the moms and dads of the nation's elite high school football players - all on track for Division I schools - why there prepared to let their sons play football in such heat, and, of course, because I had promised the organizers that I would put on two parent seminars. As it turned out, the trip and my talks were a big success. While some of the parents expressed concern for their sons' safety playing in such oppressive heat, as far as I am aware, no athlete suffered heat stroke, fortunately.

But I continued to feel the heat even when I returned to the office this week, but this time the heat was coming from concerned parents. My voice mailbox was chock full of messages from parents frantically calling from all around the country, all asking variations on the same question: "My son was told they would be playing in pads (football) tonight and it is already 100 degrees in the shade where we are in Oklahoma. What should I do? He won't make the team if he cannot try out." I tried my best to answer all the phone calls, which were coming in at a rate of at least one an hour,  and to respond to e-mails and Facebook posts, all asking how they could keep their kids safe in the high heat.

The problem was that I was becoming as hot and bothered as the parents. On the one hand, I knew that MomsTeam had the very best and most comprehensive Hydration Center on the Internet with some of the country's top hydration experts in the world who review and guide us to give out the most accurate up-to-date information. On the other, it seemed that, no matter how much information we provide, no matter how often coaches and programs are warned against the dangers of playing sports when the heat index soars, too many (with rare exceptions, such as the recent Schwan's USA Cup youth soccer tournament) continue holding practices and games without frequent hydration breaks, or having the ice baths on hand to rapidly cool down players if they suffer heat stroke. Either they haven't been properly educated about hydration and heat illness (which given the highly publicized deaths of high school and professional athletes is hard to fathom) or they stubbornly cling to the old school belief and macho culture that still pervades youth sports - especially in contact and collision sports like football and lacrosse - that forcing players to practice in excessively high heat somehow toughens them up and makes them better athletes, subscribing, I guess, to the old adage, "What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger."

Knowlege is power

So how do I answer the parent phone calls and e-mails? By letting them know about the guidelines many state athletic associations and programs have put in place in recent years to try to keep kids safe playing and practicing football and other sports outdoors in the heat and humidity gripping the country. I suggest that they share the link for the articles to all of their Facebook friends and to print up copies to give to the coaching staff and other parents.

Knowledge, it is often said, is power. Our mission at MomsTeam, as it has been for the past eleven years, is to empower sports parents through education. We know that more and more parents are listening. Ultimately, though, it is up to the parents to turn the heat up on the coaches so they don't do the same to their kids. If they don't, we'll all be scrambling to put out the inevitable, but preventable, fires.

Heads up to physicians and health care providers in the Garden State: here's a chance to learn about sport concussions from some of top experts in the field as, this coming Sunday, July 17, 2011, the Athletic Trainers Society of New Jersey will hold its second annual sports concussion summit in Plainsboro.

The summit will feature a star-studded lineup of sports concussion experts, including MomsTeam's contributing expert emeritus, Dr. Robert Cantu of Brigham & Women's Hospital in Boston, MomsTeam's expert sports concussion neuropsychologist and Director of the Sports Concussion Center of New Jersey, Dr. Rosemarie Scolaro Moser, Dr. Steven Broglio, Director of the Neurotrauma Research Laboratory in the School of Kinesiology at the University of Michigan, and Dr. Jason Mihalik of the Matthew A. Gfeller Sport-Related Traumatic Brain Injury Research Center at the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill. 

Among the important topics to be discussed will be:

• Office/Sideline evaluation of concussion
• Assessing balance in concussion
• The role of  neurocognitive testing
• Adolescent concussion and cognitive rest; and
• Return to play considerations.

New Jersey is among the twenty-four states that have passed strong youth sports concussion safety laws in the past two years.  One of the components of New Jersey's law, which goes into effect for the 2011-2012 academic year, is a requirement that all school physicians, all those who coach a public or private school interscholastic sport, and all athletic trainers involved in a public or private interscholastic school program receive training in concussion evaluation and management.   

What better way to learn about sport concussions than from some of the country's most knowledgeable concussion experts.

To download a registration brochure, click here or visit the ATSNJ's website and click on Events.

Since April I have had a front row seat watching the Decorah Eagles, one of best teams in the nation, at work.

Who are they? A baseball team? A lacrosse team?

No.  These Eagles are actually, well, a family of American bald eagles from Decorah, Iowa - members of the bird family Accipitridae and a proud symbol of America - whose teamwork between the eagle parents (coaches) and the players (eaglets, now fledglings) set an example from which every youth sports stakeholder- parents, coaches, fans and especially young athletes - can learn valuable lessons. 

A little back ground is in order. The non-profit Raptor Resource Project, which specializes in the preservation of falcons, eagles, ospreys, hawks, and owls, installed a video camera that monitored an eagles' nest 24/7 beginning back in February as the nest was just being prepared. I, along with millions of other viewers around the world, was given the gift of a front row seat, courtesy of Ustream, which allowed us to watch real-time, stream video of the eggs hatching, the eaglets growing, weathering the many challenges they faced in the wild, and finally, this past week, leaving the nest for the first time (becoming fledglings) and taking flight.

Lessons for youth sports coaches

What are some of the lessons I think youth sports coaches can learn from watching eagles care for and successfully raise their young?

First, the lesson of unconditional love: like the mother and father eagles, sports coaches are most successful, in my view, when they treat all players fairly and are committed to teaching them the skills they need to succeed, both in sports and out.

Second, that like eagle parents, if a coach gives players the tools to succeed, and understands that each will develop on their own, unique developmental timetable, whether they ultimately succeed (literally or figuratively fly on their own) will be up to the athletes/eaglets themselves (what is called natural selection or survival of the fittest in the wild or moving up the competitive ladder in sports). The three eaglets were born on different days (the first hatching on April 2nd, the second on April 2nd, and the youngest on April 6th), yet their parents played no favorites. All were treated the same, and given the same chance to succeed. So, too, it should be with youth sports coaches who have players of different ages, different skill levels, and different personalities: give every member of the team an equal chance to succeed by giving them equal playing time (before age 12 or 13), and significant playing time (up to, but not including high school varsity or elite level competition), and the rest will be up to them.

Third, that, like eagle parents successfully raising eaglets into fledglings, coaching requires dedication, patience and the ability to stay calm, cool, and collected. The three eaglets, branded E-1, E-2 and E-3, have different personalities: one was the "class clown", one was overly vocal middle child, and the third the laid back mellow team player. As I watched the "coaches" raise this diverse group, I realized that the eaglets had a successful outcome because of the dedication, devotion, patience, and unconditional love their parents showed them. Sure, I witnessed the coaches bickering about certain things (where to place a new twig in the nest, which was downright hilarious to watch), but for the majority of the time they were modeling teamwork and how to win.

The Decorah Eagles taught regular viewers of the video feed other lessons as well: like how to fight off the competition (owls), how to play in any weather condition (literally buried under snow during a storm at one point) and how to respect each other (an occasional peck by one eaglet to the head of another eaglet was the most sibling rivalry we ever saw), and, ultimately how to play well, have some fun and to win against the toughest competition nature could hand out.

A duty of stewardship

The eaglets are now out of the nest and on the wing, but are still being fed and watched over by mom and dad, yet soon they will all go their separate ways to live their own lives. I cannot claim to have played any role in how the eaglets were raised, though I have felt like a god mother, always watching and worrying. Pride is for those who have directly helped to determine the positive outcome: the eagle parents and the folks at the Raptor Resource Project, who have dedicated their lives to bringing back an eagle population that was close to being decimated in the 1980s. As one of the wonderful guest writers, Sherri Elliott, posted on the Raptor Research Project website, "If there's one thing the worldwide audience can take from this adventure it is that all life is so very, very precious, and as stewards it is OUR obligation to protect and preserve."

I wonder, if every youth sports venue across America sent a live video feed to the web to put on to display every action by the coaches, players, officials, and parents during a sports season, would we as parents be able to claim a similar sense of satisfaction as the eagle parents? Would coaches be able to claim their season was a success, even if they lost some games along the way, because they treated all their players equally, with the same respect, with the same commitment to helping them learn new skills and become better players? Would our young athletes take away lessons that they could use when their sports careers ended to survive in a competitive world outside of sports?

Like Sherri Elliott, I, too, feel that it is our duty as the adult stakeholders in youth sports, to see sports, like life, as "so very, very precious," and our obligation to be stewards of the game; "to protect and preserve."

If, as adults, we do not all contribute to healthy sports outcomes, I fear for the future of youth sports, just like the Raptor Resource Project feared for the future of eagles. I worry that the wrong kind of stewards will turn something that can be so beneficial to kids into something that is no longer about the process of learning and growing but only about winning and separating winners from losers.

I am betting on the Decorah Eagles in all of us.