It is no secret that in the sporting world the concussion age is upon us. This can be disconcerting for hesitant parents and guardians. After all, no one wants to put their loved ones in harm’s way.
Ask former Mansfield Christian Flames basketball player Bryce Ernsberger and his parents, and they will tell you about how serious concussions can be.
Ernsberger suffered a freak concussion on January 26, during a basketball game. “Basically, I went up to grab a rebound… a guy went to box me out backwards and hit my knees,” he recounted, “I went down, and I landed on the back of my neck.”
Bryce spent two full days at hospitals before he was allowed to come home.
Even now—nearly ten months later—there are still lingering signs of the concussion. “I would say, in my opinion, I don’t know that even now he is 100%,” Bryce’s father, Troy Ernsberger, said. “There are still times that there’s a blank stare that he never had before… he is probably at about 90% right now.”
“I would compare it to not knowing the right word, which happens to everybody, but sometimes I can’t remember a situation that I always remember,” Bryce offered about his memory.
His stepmother, Lynn, said that the family was concerned that Bryce might never make a full recovery. “[There is] the fear of ‘how much will he get back?’ or ‘will he ever be able to get close to where he was?’ There for a while, we weren’t even sure that he would graduate high school.”
Bryce Ernsberger never went back to school on a full-time basis and he missed nearly an entire month of classes. He did, however, graduate and was permitted to shoot a free-throw during the local basketball All-Star game, a moment that the Ernsbergers will never forget.
For student-athletes in Ohio, the Ohio High School Athletic Association (OHSAA) and the Ohio’s state government passed new laws dealing with concussions on April 26.
These new policies allow schools to move in the right direction in regards to the education, prevention, and treatment of concussions. One such school that is particularly progressive is near Richland’s neck of the woods.
Erin Diebler, athletic trainer at Ashland High School, said, “Ten years ago, many concussions were not reported to coaches because they were categorized as just getting your ‘bell rung.’ A concussion is actually a traumatic brain injury.”
Knowing that concussions are brain injuries changes the way in which professionals approach their research; therefore, professionals now understand that concussions, like Ernsberger’s case, go far beyond simply getting back onto the field of play.
Diebler said, “We are seeing more and more how concussions are affecting the students not only on the field but off of it. Children’s Hospitals are using athlete specific clearance forms. These forms specify to parents, teachers, and athletic trainers when the student athlete is allowed to return fully to school, work, and sports activities.”
With new understanding comes new responsibility. Ashland High and other schools are making sure that their students are educated properly. “Each sport season has a parent’s meeting. Our AD [Rick Brindley] takes this time to go over concussion information with the parents as well as the athletes,” Diebler said of AHS. “They [parents and students] are very well educated, but you always a have negative and positive side.”
The negative side of which Diebler speaks probably stems from the abundance of discourse that media and other sources continue to have about concussions. It has sparked a new and understandable wave of sensitivity and concern.
“Some [students] will panic every time they get a headache thinking it is a concussion, which makes it hard to differentiate between the actual concussions and psychologically induced concussion like symptoms. So you always have to be cautious with everyone,” she said of this new concern.
Diebler said that the school will make sure students do not return to athletics too soon by implementing another form of testing, a kind of testing that may dramatically improve the treatment and understanding of concussions.
“Ashland High School has received funding through the local hospital to pay for imPACT database testing. Each athlete will take a baseline test prior to the start of the season,” she said. “If the athlete were to have a concussion, they will take a follow-up test to be compared to the original baseline test. The athlete will not be allowed to begin their return to play protocol until the post concussion test is within a certain percentage of the baseline exam.”
These are tremendous steps forward and will provide new ways to prevent lifelong side-effects from concussions.
At OHSAA, Tim Stried, director of information services, said that there is another important partnership that everyone should recognize. “Now that a concussion management policy is a part of state law, you could say that the OHSAA is a partner of state government.”
Stried also pointed out that every student-athlete and parent is now educated about concussions prior to any athletic practices. “As part of the state law, a form must be read and signed by all student-athletes and parents that educates them on the importance of this issue, what symptoms are associated with a concussion, and the return-to-play policy.”
To aid that effort, the OHSAA is supplying information that can be used to help prevent and understand concussions. “We regularly include pieces of [concussion] information in our correspondence with member schools, such as preseason meeting DVDs and sample agendas, our social media, articles in our quarterly magazine, etc.,” Stried said. “Basically, all that information and effort is meant to make concussions something that’s on the forefront of coaches and officials and how to handle a situation when a concussion might have been sustained.”
Contact may never be taken completely out of sports, and consensus is that things will happen, but we can now begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel and clear path through the concussion age. Schools like Ashland find themselves moving forward with new information.
An athlete may not want to come out during big games, but it is important for these athletes to know that there is a lot more at stake than simply losing.
“When you don’t see that same person coming around, you need to take that extremely seriously,” Troy Ernsberger said, urging parents and guardians to do their own research. “Understand that there are big changes going on in the brain that no one truly understands.”
If you have any questions or want to learn more about this topic, Stried urges you to consult the OHSAA website with any questions you might have about the prevention, education, and treatment of concussions.
