Managing concussions among high school athletes

Concussions are a problem that plague athletes of all ages. Sustaining multiple concussive blows can affect a person’s ability to properly return to everyday functions. We took a look at how a local high school and health center are addressing this issue.

Big hits do more than just stall a drive. They can stall a student’s performance in the classroom as well. For nearly four years now Genesis Rehabilitation Services has offered a Concussion Management Program to help with this issue.

"What we do is we do a S.C.A.T on them, get a baseline idea of how they’re doing and how bad their concussion is," Physical Therapist at Genesis, Jenna Scholl-Roregrig said.

S.C.A.T. or sport concussion assessment tool assess both mental and physical traits before and after patients go through the program. Scholl-Rorehrig works with patients in the program and said for student-athletes it’s Genesis’s responsibility to return them to play and to the classroom safely.

"If they can do the mental and physical together without any symptoms and without any stuttering then they’re usually able to go back," Scholl-Rorehrig said. "That’s pretty much the sure indicator."

Genesis is working with Maysville and other area high schools to make sure that when students return to the field they do so safely and don’t return to the sidelines.

At Maysville, athletic trainer Joe Johnson feels it is extremely important to make sure athletes do not return to the field prematurely.

"They go through the progressions to make sure the symptoms don’t come back once they’re free from that then we feel pretty comfortable letting them return," Johnson said.

At the start of each season every athlete is given a baseline impact test. When an athlete sustains a concussion they retake the same test.

"They’re a tremendous help to us because what it does, it establishes a baseline test for each individual athlete," Johnson said.

"If they have any neurological symptoms, if there are any symptoms what so ever they’re automatically not allowed to go back," Shall-Rorehrig said.

Only when a player achieves the same or higher score on the impact test can they move on to working back into competition. Whenever Johnson sees signs of a player being concussed that athlete is immediately out for 24 hours and then evaluated and put through Maysville’s five step protocol.