AFL backs in its current concussion framework despite an alarming study
The AFL has maintained its current stance on concussion despite an alarming study regarding recommended return-to-play measures. It claims its satisfactory, but a concussion campaigner disagrees.
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The AFL has backed in its concussion protocols despite fears players are being returned to play too soon.
The league is under pressure to revise its return-to-play framework in the wake of an alarming New Zealand study which showed only 45 per cent of athletes ha fully recovered from their clinical concussions inside 14 days.
It is in contrast to the league’s own community concussion guidelines which states that “most cases of concussion in Australian football recover within 10-14 days of injury” and that only “a small number of cases, recovery may take weeks to months”.
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But that assessment has been labelled as dangerously outdated by concussion campaigner Peter Jess who says the league should abolish the SCAT5 tests for a “more thorough” multimodal assessment.
He says players should be protected by a 28-day recovery period.
As recent as 2013, a consensus statement in the British Journal of Sports Medicine said “the majority (80-90 per cent) of concussions resolve in a short (7-10 day) period”.
But those previous findings have been strongly challenged by the latest study performed at the New Zealand Concussion Clinic which assessed 594 participants including many rugby union players over a two-year period.
Lead author Dr Stephen Kara said recovery from a sports-related mild traumatic brain injury “is slower than previous international consensus statements have indicated”.
The AFL has recently bolstered its return to-play protocols so that players have to pass the league’s testing method five days before they play.
The league was adamant its concussion process was satisfactory in the wake of the eye-opening new research.
“Earlier this year the AFL made changes to the concussion guidelines for the 2020 AFL & AFLW seasons to reflect our ongoing conservative approach in managing concussions at the elite level,” an AFL spokesman said.
“The health and safety of all players is paramount and in recent years we have strengthened match day protocols, changed the Laws of the Game to further discourage high contact, improved the identification of potential concussive incidents through video, and we continue to invest in research to better understand concussion at all levels of the game.”
Jess said the AFL had to better protect its players.
“The fact they keep referencing back to a consensus statement and saying it is world’s best practice gives people the impression of a false sense of security about their return to play protocols,” Jess said.
It comes as former St Kilda full-forward Paddy McCartin said he was ready to return to top-flight football next season, despite his concussion history including eight head knocks.
McCartin, who was delisted by the Saints last year, said he had made better-than-expected progress in his brain rehabilitation at Epworth Hospital in recent months and was training most days.
McCartin last year said he was “a shell of a person” as he battled the symptoms of his concussions, including insomnia, headaches and sensitivity to light and sound.
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Jess urged McCartin and others to take a long-term view.
“(Concussions) build up over time,” he said on Monday.
Slowly but surely the brain becomes dysfunctional from the accumulation of the structural damage.”
Originally published as AFL backs in its current concussion framework despite an alarming study
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