IHSA Launches New Initiative To Address Concussions
CHICAGO (CBS) -- The Illinois High School Association has announced new measures to protect student-athletes on the field.
Sports organizations across the nation have come under fire for not doing enough to safeguard against concussions, particularly in football, and the IHSA's "Play Smart. Play Hard" campaign was designed to address that.
The initiative includes creating an advisory council to review student athletic programs and make recommendations for safety improvements.
The IHSA also has created a website dedicated to concussion education and has called for better partnerships with the medical community when it comes to understanding the impact of concussions.
"We know more than we've ever known, but don't know as much as we'll know tomorrow, or next week, or in the years to come," IHSA executive director Marty Hickman said.
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Among those on the advisory panel is Tregg Duerson, the son of former Chicago Bears safety Dave Duerson, who took his own life in 2011, after suffering multiple concussions during his playing career. Dave Duerson donated his brain to concussion research, and neurologists confirmed he had chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a progressive degenerative disease caused by head injuries.
Tregg Duerson played football at Loyola Academy and the University of Notre Dame, and Hickman said he brings a unique perspective to the concussion issue.
Dave Duerson's former Bears teammate, quarterback Jim McMahon, also has been suffering from dementia, as a result of concussions he suffered playing football. He has said he was forced to play with a broken neck and now has to have his spine brought back into alignment every few months to take pressure off his brain and help him with pain and memory problems.
McMahon said he understands why former players like Duerson might commit suicide.
"I can see how guys, now, how some of these guys have ended their lives, because of the pain," McMahon said last summer.
He said he has suffered migraines so painful that he wouldn't come out of his darkened bedroom for weeks or months at a time.
"I'm glad I don't have any weapons in my house, or else I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be here," he said.
The new campaign comes on the heels of a class-action lawsuit seeking to force the IHSA to change its concussion policy. The lawsuit seeks requirements that medical professionals be at all high school games and practices, and that the IHSA pay for a monitoring program for former high school football players dating back to 2002, to determine if they have developed long-term complications from concussions.
Over the past decade, reports of discussions in high school sports have doubled.
