Concussion history and career status influence sports concussion assessment tool (SCAT-3) performance in elite football players

Abstract

Objective To determine if concussion history and career status influences baseline Sports Concussion Assessment Tool (SCAT-3) performance in elite football players. Design/methods Fifty-seven elite football players (age 29.39 ± 7.49 years) categorized by career status (draft prospects, active professional players and retired professional players) underwent SCAT-3 assessments. The SCAT-3 was administered in accordance to published recommendations.14 To examine our primary purpose, participants were placed into either a low concussion history (0-1 concussions) or multiple concussion history (2 + concussions) group. A Mann-Whitney U test was used to examine the differences of concussion history on SCAT-3 total symptoms, total symptom severity, SAC total scores, and m-BESS balance scores. To examine our secondary purpose, a Kruskal-Wallis test and a post-hoc analysis was used to analyze differences between career status categories. Results At baseline, common baseline symptoms were: fatigue (45.6%), trouble falling asleep (35.1%), difficulty remembering (33.3%) and irritability (22.8%) 36.8% reported no symptoms. The low concussion (0-1) group reported fewer symptoms (U = 608.50, p = 0.001), less symptom severity (U = 598.00, p = 0.001), and produced greater scores on the Standardized Assessment of Concussion (SAC) total scores compared to the multiple concussion (2+) group (U = 253.00, p = 0.024), but no differences were observed on modified Balance Error Scoring System (m-BESS) scores (U = 501.50, p = 0.066) on the Mann-Whitney U test. The Kruskal-Wallis Test and post-hoc analysis indicated retired players were significantly different from draft prospects and current professional players for total symptom scores (p < 0.001), total symptom severity (p < 0.001), SAC total scores (p = 0.030), and m-BESS (p < 0.001). Conclusions Concussion history and career status appear to influence performance on the SCAT-3 in elite football players. With this in mind, future research is recommended to determine normative scores on the SCAT-3 for elite football players.