Project BRAIN

The Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Association has voted for a new concussion policy for coaches, athletes, parents and officials for the upcoming school year. The TSSAA Board of Control approved the new policy unanimously Wednesday during a conference call.

The TSSAA is adopting the National Federation of State High School Associations policy which requires any player who exhibits signs of a concussion to be removed from the game. The player can't return until cleared by the appropriate health care professional.

Executive director Bernard Childress says the new policy keeps athletics in the proper perspective by putting the safety of students first.

The TSSAA wants officials at every member school to know the symptoms and what steps to take when a student displays signs of a possible concussion. They want officials to meet with coaches immediately and to share information with parents and students before the upcoming school year.

Source:  The Tennessean

It’s not just the NFL. Concussions among high school football, basketball and rugby players are vastly underreported and underestimated and are hurting student-athlete in the classroom, according to testimony on Capitol Hill on Thursday.

Sports-injury pros are trying to get young players to follow the motto “When in doubt, sit it out.” But too many athletes feel pressure from coaches and teammates — and occasionally from parents and themselves — to get back in the game despite an injury that turns out to be a concussion.

Michelle Pelton, a 19-year-old former high school basketball and softball player from Swansea, Mass., told the House Education and Labor Committee: “I received 5 concussions … during my high school years. … While all my classmates were involved in senior activities I was home depressed and in constant pain, and life had become a blur. ... I lost potential four-year scholarships. … My dreams were crushed.”

Read more of this story at Politico.

Tennesseans seeking assistance with a brain injury can contact Project BRAIN Coordinator Paula Denslow at paula_d@tndisability.org. 

People who experience serious head injuries often require days -- if not weeks -- of medical care to get back on their feet. For most of them, the mental aftershocks will last long after they've checked out of the hospital.

More than half of all people who suffer a traumatic brain injury will become depressed in the year after the injury, a rate eight times higher than in the general population, according to a new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association. And only about 45 percent of those who do become depressed are likely to receive adequate treatment.

"We're not talking about normal day-to-day changes in mood, but symptoms that last for more than two weeks," says the lead author of the study, Charles Bombardier, Ph.D., professor of rehabilitation medicine at the University of Washington School of Medicine.

To read more of this article from CNN.

Tennesseans seeking assistance with a brain injury can contact Project BRAIN Coordinator Paula Denslow at paula_d@tndisability.org.

Family Voices of Tennessee, the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center, and Project BRAIN are partnering to host a family conference providing information on an array of topics impacting children with special health care needs and/or disabilities.

Topics Include: 504 health plans, challenging behaviors, HIPAA and health care rights, TBI (Traumatic Brain Injury), transitioning to adult health services, and autism.

• Conference Sessions are Free
• Vendors will be on site throughout the day to share their resources with families.
• Family organizations will be present to offer supports and additional information.
• Confirmed speakers: SCARAB Behavioral Health Services and STEP (Support Training for Exceptional Parents).
• Scholarships may be available for lunch, travel or childcare.
• Box lunches will be $10.00.
• Registration requested by March 12, 2010
  

Download a registration form (PDF)

Download a registration form (MS Word)

Want to set up a vendor or organizational booth? Just give us a call at 1 (888) 643-7811 or drop a line to julie_s@tndisability.org for a vendor registration form.

For more information: contact Family Voices of Tennessee at 1 (888) 643-7811 or by email at julie_s@tndisability.org

School is back in session, temperatures are dropping, and many are looking forward to football in just a few weeks.  It must be Fall in Tennessee and with it the Fall issue of Project BRAIN's quarterly newsletter is hot off the press.  It includes stories about:

• A partnership with the UT Medical Center in Knoxville
• With a new school year comes new sporting events and concussions
• Project BRAIN welcomes a new staff member - Wanda Baker
• A tribute to recently passed disability advocate Charles Moore

To download the newsletter in PDF

To download the newsletter in MS Word