Why it is a good idea to seek care and not “play through”
A concussion is a disruption of your brain function caused by trauma, mostly without visible damage on brain scans. You do not even need to hit your head to experience a concussion. Since female athletes around the world participate more and more in sports that are considered high-risk for concussion, such as skiing, soccer, handball, basketball, boxing/combat sports, football, rugby, or ice hockey, we have learned a lot about differences between the genders.
In sports with similar rules, females suffer concussions more frequently than males and experience or report a higher number and severity of symptoms. Female athletes also take longer to recover than male athletes. This raises very interesting questions.
Rehabilitation after a concussion is where medicine has made most of the progress over recent years. Today, a concussion is considered a treatable injury. Your doctor may prescribe specific exercises that help you to recover, similar to the rehabilitation after a hamstring strain.
Do the above observations imply that female athletes need different treatment and rehabilitation protocols than those developed and prescribed to male athletes?
Date: Tuesday, June 22, 2021
Time: 17H00 GMT
Located: Online – A Login link will be provided to you prior to the event
Sign Up Below
Having trouble registering? Click here to register on Eventbrite.
We are privileged to host two experts in sports concussion recognition, treatment, and rehabilitation who will explain to us what happens in the brain when you suffer a concussion, the 11 R’s, and the latest in treatment. They will also answer your questions on concussion.
This will be the first in our women’s sports medicine series of webinars.
About Prof. Jon Patricios
Prof. Jon Patricios is founder and Director of Sports Concussion South Africa and sports concussion consultant to the South African Rugby Union, where he developed the concussion protocols for their prevention programme. He is a member of the World Rugby Concussion Advisory Group and a board member of the International Concussion in Sports Group, where he co-authored the 5th International Consensus Statement on Concussion in Sport. Jon developed the Sports Concussion Office Assessment Tool (SCOAT), a clinical assessment tool for concussion, and he was a member of the 2016 Sports Concussion Assessment 5 (SCAT5) and Child SCAT 5 working and writing groups.
Jon has been a sports medicine physician for over 25 years and worked with school, club, provincial, and international sports teams in rugby, cricket, soccer, athletics, and basketball. He has been President of the South African Sports Medicine Association for two terms. Currently, he is Director of Waterfall Sports Orthopaedic Surgery and Professor of Sport and Exercise Medicine at Wits Sports and Health (WiSH), the Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, in Johannesburg, South Africa. He is also an editor of the British Journal of Sports Medicines.
About Dr. Leigh Gordon
Dr. Leigh Gordon is a Sports & Exercise Medicine physician who has studied extensively, both locally and overseas. She is very busy as the team doctor for the Springbok Sevens Rugby men’s and women’s teams since 2015. Dr. Gordon is the Medical trainer for World Rugby Immediate Care in Rugby as well as the Medical Officer for the International Field Hockey federation. She is one of the three founding partners at Cape Sports Medicine, in Cape Town, South Africa.
