All Articles by Brooke de Lench

At the beginning of the month, 8-year-old Gabriel Mendoza was hanging on the crossbar of a soccer goal post during a soccer game in South Mountain, Arizona, when it fell on him. He was the ninth boy in the past three years to die from a falling goal post. News reports of his death did not say whether the goal post was anchored or, if it was anchored, whether it was anchored incorrectly.

With several recent studies demonstrating the clinical value of neuropsychological (NP) testing in evaluating the cognitive effects of and recovery from sport-related concussions, such testing has become increasingly popular in recent years, with the 2008 Zurich consensus statement on sports concussions¹ viewing NP testing as an "aid in the clinical decisionmaking process" and an "important component in any return to play protocol." 

The sad fact, and what makes it sometimes hard for parents to truly believe that programs are taking concussions seriously, is that many of the sports programs in which their children participate do not follow any set of return-to-play guidelines, and if they do follow guidelines, they are too liberal in terms of same-day return-to-play (RTP). When parents are kept in the dark like that, when they have no clue as to how a program treats concussions, their anxiety level naturally goes up.