Allen Champagne, a Queen’s PhD student, is helping football students better their technique to prevent injuries. He has gone to several other cities in eastern Ontario and today was his second time coaching community teams in Kingston.
A recent Canadian government study showed that 64% of visits to the emergency room for children and youth are due to sports injuries, and 39% of them are either head injuries or concussions.
That’s what make Champagne’s work so important. He’s currently a PhD student at Queen’s University and he’s working with community football teams across eastern Ontario to learn about what is causing injuries specially concussions to football players.
For his research, he is taping the students, timing them and putting them through exercises so he can observe their techniques.
Champagne is looking out for “how they tackle, how they block, where their head is,” he said. “We score each kid so we’re going to use that to help the coach understand where the risk is.”
Vince Wawryk, parent to a 14-year-old first year football player said, “I’m glad that there is this kind of program.”
Between 2004 and 2014, football, soccer and hockey have shown a 40 per cent increase in head injuries for children and youth.
Another parent at the workshop, Sharon Nixon — whose son is only 11 and is also a first-year football player — has seen injuries very closely in her family. “I have a cousin who ended his varsity career with a concussion,” Nixon said. “But to know that precautions are being taken and measures are in place to teach the kids properly is reassuring.”
Champagne hopes to combat this growing problem. He wants to take this study to high schools across Ontario.
“We hope this becomes a standard for teams,” said Champagne.
Champagne plans on releasing the results of his study in August.
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