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The injury-prevention charity Parachute is tasked with leading the development of harmonized concussion protocols through an advisory committee that includes doctors, teachers and coaches from across the country.

The guidelines will be derived from the latest research to come out of the fifth International Consensus Conference on Concussion taking place later this week in Berlin.

What we really need to work on is consistent approaches to care. Guidelines are a good start

“We need to make sure everybody is on the same page so parents don’t get one message from the hockey coach and the other message from the soccer coach,” said Dr. Charles Tator, a neurosurgeon at the Krembil Neuroscience Centre of Toronto Western Hospital and co-chair of the Parachute advisory committee. “We don’t want an injured youngster going to the family doctor and getting one opinion that it was a concussion and then going to the emergency department and hearing it wasn’t a concussion.

“In order to diagnose concussions, you really need an army of people who are knowledgeable – the coach, the athlete, and the players themselves.”

In the meantime, Qualtrough advises parents to only enrol their children in sporting activities with an established concussion protocol in place.

“If I sprain my ankle, you don’t put me back out in the hockey arena,” she said. “If I sprain my brain, you shouldn’t put me back either. We need to be very clear that a concussion is a brain injury. There are ways we can minimize this injury. There are ways we can treat it.

“But we need to acknowledge this is a serious injury that you can’t tough through.”