News & Studies

The veto by California governor Jerry Brown of AB 1890, a bill that would have made it illegal for anyone to call themselves an "athletic trainer" without actually being one has a top interscholastic sports administrator in the Golden State asking why.

The Arena Football League (AFL), in partnership with Brain Sentry, has become the first professional sports league to require helmet-mounted impact sensors to alert sideline personnel to hits that may cause concussion.

A simple, easy-to-construct and easy-to-use dropstick device to measure reaction time, which is impaired after concussion, could help sideline personnel identify athletes to remove from play because of possible concussion, and in concussion assessment and management.

The National Athletic Trainers' Association has released a new position statement on the management of sport concussion. The statement is an update to the NATA's original 2004 concussion guidelines and addresses education, prevention, documentation and legal aspects, evaluation and return-to-play considerations. In particular, the authors amended the return-to-play guidelines and now recommend no return on the day the athlete is concussed.

Some children and adolescents who have continue to report symptoms weeks and months after suffering a concussion may be exaggerating or feigning symptoms in order to get out of schoolwork or sports or for other reasons unrelated to their injury, says a new study in the journal Pediatrics.

There is good news and bad news in a first-of-its-kind study about implementation of the nation's first youth sports concussion safety legislation. The good news is that nearly all football and soccer coaches at public high schools in Washington State have completed the required concussion education, are generally knowledgeable about concussions, and are comfortable in deciding when to refer players for additional evaluation for a suspected concussion. The bad news is that concussion education of athletes and parents was much less extensive.

A simple vision test performed on the sports sidelines was able to identify nearly 8 out of 10 athletes later found to have suffered a concussion, and when test results were combined with tests for cognition and balance, allowed identification of concussed athletes with 100% accuracy, according to researchers at New York University.

A 2014 study (Rowson S, Duma S, et al 2014) reporting that football helmet design can reduce concussion risk has prompted criticism from some of the football helmet manufacturers whose helmets were not involved in the study. In the interest of accurate and complete reporting on the study, set out below is the full text of an email dated February 10, 2014 from Rob Erb, Chief Executive Officer of Schutt Helmets.

In an effort to reduce contact above the shoulders and lessen the risk of head and neck injuries in football, the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) has revised the rules governing high school football for the 2014 season to add definitions of "targeting" and "defenseless player."