NEW YORK, Dec 28 (Reuters Health) -- When should an athlete with a head
injury be allowed to return to play? According to one group of researchers,
current guidelines about concussion might endanger players' health.
"Currently, no research exists to support the specific grades of
concussion and related return-to-play recommendations," according to Dr. Michael
Collins of the Henry Ford Health System in Detroit.
Three popular sets of guidelines help doctors treat sports-related
concussions, Collins and two colleagues explain in the Journal of the American
Medical Association for December 21. They note that these guidelines differ in
their grading of concussion severity and in their recommendations about
treatment.
And none of the guidelines are based on data from scientific studies, the
authors say.
All three sets of guidelines place a heavy emphasis on whether and for how
long an athlete is unconscious, according to Collins and his associates. They
maintain that there is no scientific evidence that loss of consciousness is more
important than other aspects of concussion.
Current guidelines also fail to consider individual and age-related
differences in an athlete's response to injury, the authors point out.
Studies are under way to collect data on athletic concussions, they
report. In the meantime, they say, "management of the athlete following
concussive injury should be individualized and based on clinical judgment and
experience," not on arbitrary guidelines.
