HJBR Jul/Aug 2023

CTE 12 JUL / AUG 2023 I  HEALTHCARE JOURNAL OF BATON ROUGE cheating on their baseline tests so they are able to stay in the game if concussed? Baseline tests are not the panacea they are perceived to be. They rarely help with diagnosing a concussion, and while they are helpful to a doctor when determining return to play, the doctor can make good decisions without it. Having a baseline test may iden- tify the rare athlete who has lingering defi- cits but is hiding their symptoms. What type of provider should be at youth games to assess concussions? An athletic trainer should be at all contact and collision sport games and practices. If they aren’t there, more concussions can be missed. Have we advanced in the treatment of concussions in the last decade? There is no question we’ve made advancements. To give you a window, we used to call our education program a “Con- cussion Clinic.”At that time, there were zero hospital-affiliated concussion clinics in the U.S. Now, there are so many multidisci- plinary concussion clinics offering concus- sionmanagement and rehabilitation that we had to change the name. We now know that one concussion makes you more susceptible to another. Can you provide us with the latest research on that? Are current return to play rules adequate, and how do we know? Having a concussion tends to make you more likely to have one in the future, although that is not the case for every- one. The more concussion research is done, the more deficits we find that linger beyond symptom resolution. We need more research on the harms of returning quickly. I have read that an athlete’s brain is more likely to recover faster from a concussion than a non-athlete, and an elite athlete faster than a regu- lar athlete. Do we know this for a Warning labels written by attorneys clearly aware of the brain-damaging consequences of playing football, but more concerned about protecting the profits players provide. Warning label on 1989 college football helmet. Many former players we spoke with were unaware a warning label existed on their helmets. To those who have lost a friend or loved one to CTE, these labels are damning to the institutions sanctioning the game. How can one even play football while following the rules on this university-sanctioned helmet? Who was responsible for making sure this rule was followed? Warning label from current college football helmet in 8pt font. Some current players we spoke with were required to read the warning labels on their helmets once a year.