Pennsylvania legislators reintroduce bills on sports concussions

The big and burly guns were there: former Eagles stars Harold Carmichael and Mike Quick, a top NFL official, a host of influential Pennsylvania legislators.

But the most emblematic presence in a new push to protect young athletes from lasting brain injuries Wednesday was that of a lean, 23-year-old woman from Tamaqua.

Tracy Yatsko was 17, an honors student and sports star at Tamaqua Area High School, in 2005 when she went up for a rebound and cracked her head against another player's.

The blow left her dizzy, nauseous, and aching - signs of a concussion - yet she practiced the next day and played in a game the day after that.

"Even though the gym floor was spinning in circles, I played," Yatsko said at a news conference in Harrisburg, "because I felt that my team needed me."

She wound up collapsing in the locker room, and the consequences of her lack of care were lasting. She had to quit sports, her schoolwork suffered, she dropped out of college, she suffered crippling migraines, and she struggles to read and use a computer, let alone hold a job.

"There is now a heightened public awareness of the dramatic consequences of just shaking it off and getting back on the field," said State Sen. Pat Browne (R., Lehigh) as he pitched legislation to prevent just that.

Browne and State Rep. Tim Briggs (D., Montgomery) on Wednesday reintroduced identical bills aimed at better educating athletes, parents, and coaches about sports concussions, and preventing brain-injured students from returning to action too soon.

"A concussion is a brain injury, plain and simple," Briggs said. "Even a ding or a bump on the head can be serious, and can result in long-term or lifelong disability."

The bills would require students and parents to read and sign an information sheet about concussions each year before the students could take part in school athletics. Any player showing symptoms of a concussion would have to be cleared by an appropriately trained medical professional before playing again.

Nine states - including New Jersey last month - have enacted such laws, said Joe Browne, a senior adviser to NFL commissioner Roger Goodell. The NFL, which began enforcing more penalties for helmet-to-helmet contact and other illegal hits this season, wants to see an additional 10 states pass legislation this year.

"We realize in the NFL that colleges, high schools, and grassroots organizations look to us to set an example," Joe Browne said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that there are up to 3.8 million sports-related concussions each year, Briggs said, with as many as 156,000 annually in Pennsylvania.

Pat Browne said studies had found that as many as 40 percent of high school athletes return prematurely from concussions. That includes 16 percent of football players who reported going back on the day they were knocked unconscious.

Exacerbating the problem is the "tough it out" mentality that permeates even youth sports, said Quick, a former receiver who announces Eagles games on radio.

"Once a guy gets to the level of the National Football League, an athlete has already suffered many concussions," he said.

"When a kid gets hurt, he doesn't want to let the other kids around him down," Quick said, "so he wants to go back in the game. These regulations have to be in place so we can look after the kids that are not going to look after themselves."