Legislation passed and signed by Gov. Terry Branstad on Thursday designed to protect student-athletes from concussions and other brain injuries will not result in significant changes in the way such injuries are handled in Iowa. The legislation in essence codifies the protocols already in place for the last year.

The National Federation of State High Schools strengthened the wording in its rules that relate to the treatment of concussions a year ago, and that was adopted by both the Iowa High School Athletic Association and the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union, which set about establishing protocols to handle such situations.

Previously the National Federation required permission to return to action after an athlete was “apparently unconscious.” That was changed to require permission from a medical professional to return to action “if a student was exhibiting signs, symptoms and the behaviors of a concussion.”

The two Iowa athletic groups consulted with various medical groups to develop procedures for handling such events, IHSAA Assistant Executive Director Alan Beste said.

“We do feel like we were ahead of the curve on it,” Beste said. “Once the national rule changed we felt like we had to give some guidance to our schools on how to actually go about implementing the rule, and we had to give guidance to our officials on what their responsibility was.

“So I think this legislation is going to have minimal impact on how concussion is actually handled when it occurs.”

Beste said the two major changes implemented by the law are:

• The legislation specifies which medical professionals can make the decision on returning to play (physician, physician’s assistant, chiropractor, advanced registered nurse practitioner, nurse, physical therapist or licensed athletic trainer). The IHSAA and IGHSAU previously left it up to the schools to designate an appropriate medical professional to make that decision.

• Requires written permission to return to play from a designated medical professional. Previously the permission could be granted orally.

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