Abstract
The Heads Up: Concussions in High School Sports Program is a nationwide initiative established by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which aims to reduce the risks of concussions and other severe head injuries for youth athletes. Heads Up targets schools as central distributors for concussion/head-injury awareness and prevention by educating stakeholders. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Heads Up program has joined the National Federation of State High School Association in its efforts to educate and improve awareness and management of concussion through a free online training course for stakeholders of high school sports. This course, along with other publicly available resources and toolkits, are designed and tailored to educate stakeholders of all high school sports with the purpose of assisting in the implementation of safety protocols for young athletes. The Heads Up: Concussion in High School Sports initiative is a nationwide success that encompasses multiple evidence-informed components and, therefore, prevails as an exemplary practice in sports and injury prevention programs designed for recreational activities.
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Acknowledgements
The author would like to express sincere appreciation to the key informant for this case study: Kelly Sarmiento of the National Center for Injury Prevention & Control, Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, GA, USA—whose consultation made this project possible.
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Appendices
BRIO Model: Heads Up—Concussion in High School Sports
Group Served: The program targets high school sports coaches.
Goal: The program faims to educate and train coaches to recognize and minimize the risk of concussions and other head injuries in youth sports athletes.
Background | Resources | Implementation | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
In 1984, ‘second impact syndrome’ characterized highlighting the risks of multiple concussions in a short time period MTBI toolkit developed for health care providers following duty to implement national awareness and educational campaign for TBI after passing of the Children’s Health Act of 2000 Successful campaign disseminated 200,000 toolkits led to multimedia toolkit for high school athletic coaches | Environmental scan in March 2003 Literature reviews April 2003 Expert Panel convened Focus groups of high school students from two states and high school coaches from three states Telephone survey of coaches Partnership with the National Federation of State High School Associations Evaluation Study | Pilot Study with coaches in five states Comprehensive sports-related materials on concussion developed and pretested Toolkit launched nationally September 2005 US Surgeon General, Vice Admiral Richard H. Carmona, M.D., M.P.H., F.A.C.S. a key spokesperson promoting the toolkit | Target group identified Approach to concussion recognition and management improved Awareness of concussion as a serious injury achieved 20,000 toolkits distributed across the United States within 3 months of launch Internet downloads add to sustainability Materials made accessible via the CDC website Outreach through the media by email, telephone contacting editors and reporters Radio interviews discussing the toolkit. |
Life Space Model: Heads Up—Concussions in High School Sports
Sociocultural: civilization/community | Interpersonal: primary and secondary relationships | Physical environments: where we live | Internal states: biochemical/genetic and means of coping |
|---|---|---|---|
Raising awareness that any concussion is a serious injury and that adolescents are more vulnerable than adults Multiple media strategy to communicate a health-related message nationally to educate targeted audiences about concussion and its management Toolkit available in English and Spanish | Professional networks leveraged to convene an expert panel to determine best approach and development of toolkit Attitudinal change in perception of concussion by athletes, parents, coaches Behavioral change by coaches in prevention education and management approach to concussion | 20,000 Toolkits distributed in the national launch Widespread, long-term dissemination of materials through the Internet Awareness of concussion as a risk in low contact and high contact sports | Coaches acquired new skills and knowledge to recognize concussions Empowerment of coaches to educate athletes and their parents about the severity of concussion Coaches influenced to reinforce and emphasize injury prevention education |
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Looker, H. (2020). Heads Up: Concussion in High School Sports. In: Volpe, R. (eds) Casebook of Traumatic Injury Prevention. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27419-1_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27419-1_3
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