Earlier this year, the Australian Concussion Guidelines for Youth and Community Sport (Guidelines) and the Concussion and Brain Health Statement 2024 (Statement) were published.
The Guidelines are a collaboration between the Australian Institute of Sport and other organisations such as Sports Medicine Australia and the Australian Physiotherapy Association.
They are intended for underage (under 19) and community sport (where healthcare practitioners are less likely to be available) and provide guidelines on how to recognise and manage concussion from the time of injury through to return to education, work and playing sport.
The Guidelines recognise the need raised in the 2023 Senate Report on concussion and repeated head trauma in contact sports for clarity and consistency of messaging in order to optimise safety across all levels of sport.
The Statement includes a recommended return-to-play framework for elite sport for the first time and calls for professional athletes to avoid contact activities until they have been symptom-free for at least 10 days.
The Statement pertinently notes that “Mandatory stand down times need to strike a balance between being long enough to ensure recovery, but not so long that athletes are disincentivised from reporting concussion.”
The recommendations contained in the Guidelines and Statement are not mandatory and sports can choose to adopt them or not, but they help inform best practice in an environment where sports are mindful of the risk of litigation.
These updates address some of the recommendations contained in the Senate Report including one of its most contentious – the development of return-to-play protocols that can be applied across all sports.
Meanwhile, the AFL concussion actions are moving slowly through the Victorian Supreme Court system and are presently at the case management conference stage.
There have been a number of actions commenced separately by various claimants and the AFL is seeking to have all matters dealt with in a single class action. That would allow largely similar issues to be dealt with at once and makes sense practically and from a cost perspective.
While sporting codes may enact and amend concussion protocols in line with these new expectations, enforcement of these protocols will be a key obligation that clubs and organisations must ensure to avoid future litigation.
Administrators or a board of directors can’t be expected to wade through medical records and cases and have a detailed knowledge of concussion and brain health – but having general knowledge is different. If you suspect there is a risk, then you should investigate or warn.
Sporting organisations should be proactive in implementing policies and procedures such as return to play protocols, but not because they want to minimise litigation. Rather, because they want to look after their participants.
