Youth Hockey Aims to Curb Growing Concussion Risk
Dec. 28--CARY -- No. 19 slipped through the pack, his blades slicing past defenders early in a Raleigh Youth Hockey Association game last week. Older folks tracked the kinetic swarm and shouted foggy-breathed advice from behind the glass: "Center! Center! Center! Somebody hit 'im!"
Another stream of parental thoughts went unsaid. There were no cries of "Go easy on him!" or "Make sure you're in a safe position to take that board-rattling check!" or "I worry about concussions!"
Yet those concerns have found new traction in a sport with a tradition of heavy hits. The rash of concussions that has sidelined major-league players is also spreading among younger players. The Raleigh youth league also has seen a near-tripling of reported head injuries this season compared to last year.
"We're getting more reports of players out with concussions and, in fact, season-ending injuries this year," said David Wright, president of the youth league and coach of a Junior Hurricanes team. "Maybe a big part of that is due to greater awareness and publicity of concussions and the impact."
About 10 concussions have been reported so far this season in the 1,100-player league.
The NHL's Carolina Hurricanes recently suffered two serious concussions. The team's top scorer, Jeff Skinner, and a defenseman, Joni Pitkanen, are out indefinitely, and about two dozen players across the league are out with concussions, The New York Times reported last week.
That tally isn't higher this year than last, but the long-term exits of players have fueled new conversations from league headquarters down to the Raleigh IcePlex, where many players take their first checks.
While concerns mounted in recent years, the youth league raised the age limit for checking, introduced new training and hosted a scientific study by the University of North Carolina. But the risk returns with each big hit.
"They've grown so much, and they're so fast," Kay Meyer said as her son played. "I think they forget sometimes."
Young players' brains can be more susceptible to injuries, which become more serious as players suffer repeated incidents. Typical results include nausea, loss of memory and changes of personality for days or weeks. The injuries can't be diagnosed by X-ray or MRI, but doctors can diagnose the problem by its symptoms.
And while coaches once dismissed the injuries lightly, a head injury now is news for the entire league.
Each report of an injury is "devastating," said David Laszlo, the youth league's gear guru and education manager for coaches. When a player suffered a major concussion last weekend, "we knew about it within a half-hour of the ambulance leaving," he said.
Protecting players
Mike Wright, 14, son of the league president, has sustained three head injuries in his eight-year career, the latest coming barely a month ago.
Concussions' effects are not fully understood, and they can go undetected by players and parents. After his return to play, Wright's parents bought him a new concussion-resistant helmet. But he believes another bad hit could make him more vulnerable, and maybe even end his career.
Even top-of-the-line gear is no promise of total safety, said Jason Mihalik, an assistant professor at the Matthew Gfeller Traumatic Brain Injury Research Center at UNC-Chapel Hill.
"People need to understand that helmets and their standards ... are in place to prevent catastrophic injury" such as skull fracture or bleeding of the brain, Mihalik said. "Concussions only are catastrophic when they are mismanaged. A helmet won't necessarily prevent a concussion."
The most promising solutions are changes to training and teaching practices, he said.
To that end, he and a team of researchers have watched Raleigh Youth Hockey League games for five years, patching together data from helmet sensors and video cameras to analyze concussions.
His team is studying the difference between impacts in games and practices, the influence of aerobic fitness, the effects of aggression and rule-breaking and the rate of injury for different positions.
"It's not so much how hard they're hit, but did they see it coming, were they in a ready-bodied position?" Mihalik said.
The result, he hopes, will be more scientifically-informed rules and training for hockey players.
New rules in place
The Raleigh Youth Hockey League, meanwhile, has made several concussion-related changes in recent years.
This season, the local league is collecting and tracking injury reports for the first time, and it won't allow concussed players back without a doctor's note.
Under new USA Hockey rules, the league has eliminated body checking for its under-12 division, but it will allow and teach physicality at younger ages to help prepare players for the high-impact blows of the big league.
The risk of injury remains, a fact of hockey.
When players return to the ice after a concussion, "you're kind of nervous," Mike Wright said. "But once you get hit a few times, it's back to normal."
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Copyright 2011 - The Cary News, N.C.
