Canadian hockey players as young as 10 years old will be put through the same concussion testing as NHL
players this season.
With
high-profile cases involving Pittsburgh Penguins star Sidney Crosby and
others in the news over the last year, concern about head injuries has
filtered down to the youth ranks. A growing number of leagues are trying
to address it.
They include the Minor Oaks Hockey Association,
based in the Toronto suburb of Oakville, which is forcing all 2,600 of
its young athletes playing atom level or higher to go through baseline
testing before the season starts next month.
"If we make it
optional and one of the children who does not take the test gets hurt,
we’re still in the weeds, we haven’t progressed," association executive
Louis Ouellette said Monday. "We want to make it mandatory. We don’t
believe there’s any valid argument not to take it."
Minor Oaks is
the largest hockey association in Canada to mandate the neuro-cognitive
test, which is conducted by the Critical Medicine Research Group
utilizing the same so-called ImPACT standard used by the NHL, CFL and
virtually every other pro sports league.
The baseline test is
conducted online and takes about 25 minutes to complete. It provides a
detailed clinical report that can be used by doctors as a comparison
point when trying to assess if a player has recovered from a concussion.
Essentially, the testing is designed to ensure that athletes don’t return to action too soon.
"A
lot of the times you see multiple case concussions and that’s what
you’re trying to avoid," said John Chehade, director of sales and
marketing for CMRG, which administers the test. "We know that 80 percent
of concussion cases resolve in seven to 10 days, but how do you know
whose in that 80 percent category or whose in that 20 percent category
(that take longer to resolve) like Sidney Crosby?
"You just don’t know unless you have some sort of objective measurable data."
Chehade estimates his company will give baseline tests to as many as 17,000 youth hockey players across
Canada this season.
Minor
Oaks has pledged to foot the entire bill for its players — at $25 per
test, it will cost about $65,000 in total — and is providing it to those
from the lowest levels of house league right through to the top rep
teams.
"We’re absorbing the cost within our operating budget because we feel it’s important," said
Ouellette.
The practice is spreading to other youth sports as well.
For
example, the Calgary Bulldogs Football Association is in its second
season of mandatory baseline testing for the 180 players it has between
the ages of seven and 18.
"The kids at this age are at their most
susceptible (to concussions) and no one is doing anything about it,"
Bulldogs board member Terry Andryo said Monday. "Each kid gets a file
just like a medical situation. Any symptoms or on-field contact is
recorded. What we’d like to do is get it to the point where we’d like to
pass that information on to the next level where that kid is playing."
Hockey
Canada dedicates a section of its website to concussions and has
developed a six-step protocol for athletes returning from head injuries.
It doesn’t specifically mention passing a baseline test.
The
organization is unable to provide specific numbers on associations or
players who have access to that form of testing, but it has recently
taken several phone calls on the subject from hockey administrators.
"With
all the awareness around concussions and the prevention, I think a lot
of minor hockey associations have certainly locally gone and looked at
baseline testing," said Todd Jackson, Hockey Canada’s senior manager of
member services. "From our standpoint, it’s just another step in the
overall return to play process. They’re taking some steps to make sure
their kids are safe."
The issue took on even more importance for
Ouellette when his son suffered concussions in back-to-back games last
year. Like many parents, he didn’t realize anything was wrong after his
son took a hit in the first game so he encouraged him to play again the
next day.
After those incidents, he started researching
concussions in minor hockey and set about instituting the new policy
that takes effect in Oakville this season.
"I would have done it
anyway, regardless of whether my own son had sustained an injury or
not," said Ouellette. "I’ve personally had teammates of my son that have
got conflicting diagnoses from doctors and it baffles me. It baffles me
that it can be different from one child to another. …
"We don’t
want to put our children, the players, out in harm’s way without
understanding exactly how to control this and how to assess whether
they’re ready to come back."
Copyright 2011 The Associated Press.
