Evidence of meeting #2 for Subcommittee on Sports-Related Concussions in Canada in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was know.
A video is available from Parliament.
7:50 p.m.
Mr. Peter Fonseca (Mississauga East—Cooksville, Lib.)
Okay.
We're going to move over to the Liberals. Mr. Fisher, go ahead.
7:50 p.m.
Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, Lib.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
This is incredible. Thank you so much for being here. I think it was Mr. Dryden who said at one point that it's important to hear from pro sports on this, but it's so absolutely important to hear from you.
I made a comment this morning in a CBC interview about the fact that pro sports have the best knowledge, the best techniques. They know, while your coaches—well, certainly Rachel's coach—maybe didn't have that background, that knowledge.
I have two teenage athletes at home, one who just got off the ice. We have not had the misfortune you've had.
You were told, “You'll be fine” by a doctor. It shocks me, and that goes back to wanting the grassroots organizations to have some of the knowledge they have in pro sports. Maybe one of our jobs is to find a way to transfer some of that knowledge, to find the people who know the stuff about concussions at the pro level and transfer it to those grassroots levels, because it's happening at young ages.
Rachel, you said you completely ignored your symptoms for the first week. Did you know something was wrong? Did you ever think it was a concussion and you just didn't want to admit it, or were you thinking, “I'm fine, because they told me I'm fine”?
7:55 p.m.
As an Individual
I think I was definitely leaning towards what you said—thinking I must be fine because everyone said I was fine. For the first week, I completely ignored it. I had a headache, but I just thought it was a headache. I just moved forward, tried to ignore it and did what I could to distract myself by doing school work, running, or whatever it was at the time.
I think a lot of that came from my coach saying I was fine. Then, even when I initially went to my family doctor, she said, “Oh, it might just be growing pains. It's just a migraine. You'll be fine. Just take Tylenol, and it will be fine,” so that kind of got into my head. My family doctor initially didn't even think it was a concussion.
At one point, my mom said she thought I had a concussion. That's when we went forward, and we went to the hospital. At the hospital, in the ER, the doctor said, “You didn't lose consciousness, so you don't have a concussion.” Then you get in your head and think, “If I don't have a concussion, then what's wrong with me? Why am I experiencing all of this?”
7:55 p.m.
Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, Lib.
They gave you the initial tests, and you passed them all. You both were able to answer routine questions that might have been seen, at the time, only a few years ago, as being the protocol when it is thought that someone might have a concussion, questions such as “Do you know the day of the week?”, “Do you know the year?” and things like that. You both were able to pass those, yet you both had major concussions.
Carly, you said the doctor in Windsor was able to help.
7:55 p.m.
Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, Lib.
You also said you had exercises to do each day. I'm curious as to what kind of exercises you had to do every day. What things worked? Obviously you weren't able to do physical things, so this wasn't physical exercise.
7:55 p.m.
As an Individual
He made me download an app to my iPad that would.... I'm not sure what the app was called.
7:55 p.m.
As an Individual
I don't remember, but it was more for the functional part of the brain. When she went to our physiotherapist who did this impact training—and that was initially the one she had passed—it wasn't specifically looking at the functional part of the brain, whereas the functional neurologist kind of zones in on certain areas of the brain. What he described was that when they tell you, “You have a concussion. Go home and rest”, it's actually shutting down areas of the brain. He said that if it's a mild concussion, that's fine, but if your concussion is not getting better after a couple of weeks, that's when you know things are bad.
His point was that getting the treatment early on at that point and getting those areas of the brain to wake up and get stimulated is truly what needs to happen. It was a good four months into it before we even saw him, so a lot of those areas of the brain, the functional parts, needed to be woken up. That's kind of how he put it. He was trained in Atlanta, Georgia, with the same doctor who did all of Sidney Crosby's concussion work. That's whom he trained with. He even says that he's constantly learning. The brain is so abstract. He is constantly learning about it, every time he goes down for more training. A lot of the things he had to say were very interesting.
That initial one, however, didn't really key in to the functional part her brain. Even though they said, “Yes, you passed,” it wasn't specifically what she needed.
7:55 p.m.
Mr. Peter Fonseca (Mississauga East—Cooksville, Lib.)
We'll be moving over to the Conservatives and Mr. Kitchen.
7:55 p.m.
Souris—Moose Mountain, CPC
Thank you. I didn't think we were going to do that, but that's okay.
Again, thank you for your comments. I just want to touch on something.
Rachel, did you have any diagnostic imaging done?
7:55 p.m.
As an Individual
Yes. I actually completely forgot to mention that during my introduction speech.
A couple of months into it, when I wasn't getting better, my family doctor said that maybe we should get a CAT scan and an MRI done.
The CAT scan found nothing. I got the MRI done a couple of days later. It actually found bruising to the frontal lobe of my brain. That's when they said, “Okay, now we have a problem.” That was like the highlight. That's when we realized we had a problem and when the doctors realized that. That bruising was the major problem. That's where the headache and all the symptoms were coming from.
Then, I guess about a year later, when I was still having all this trouble reading and seeing, and still getting headaches, I went back. My family doctor sent me for another MRI to see if there was still a problem going on there. The MRI found that I had permanent bruising to my brain, which I still have today.
8 p.m.
Souris—Moose Mountain, CPC
Carly, you did mention that you had an MRI. Did you have any other diagnostic imaging?
8 p.m.
As an Individual
I had an X-ray when I went to the ER because I hit the side of my face. They were worried about my cheekbone because I hit it really hard. I did get an X-ray, and nothing showed in the X-ray.
8 p.m.
Souris—Moose Mountain, CPC
When we're dealing with patients, clinically it's often a big challenge for a doctor, a physical therapist, a chiropractor, or whoever it may be to go through correlating everything and getting those answers. For them to turn around and say to the parent or the child what diagnosis they want, or to give them a diagnosis that the practitioner thinks, is a challenge to try to educate the parent and the child as to the actual issue.
Did you find in any of your discussions with any of the health care practitioners that there was an educational component put in there to educate you on what a concussion really means?
8 p.m.
As an Individual
Not really. I guess everyone experiences concussions differently. In my own personal experience, I know people who have had a hit to the head and a concussion, and two weeks later there was no problem at all. What I learned was through my own experience and that of the people around me who had experienced concussions, maybe not as severe. Nobody really said, “You have a concussion, so this is what's going to happen, and this is when you'll be better.” Nobody can set it out, because everybody's different. No doctor or anyone really explained that to me, other than just the commonalities they see.
8 p.m.
As an Individual
From all the doctors I saw before Dr. Lemmo, I only got, “This is what it is”, but not “This is the next step.” There was no next step with anyone until I met Dr. Lemmo. He showed me the next step, and he made a set plan for what I was going to do, and the exercises I was going to do to get better.
8 p.m.
Mr. Peter Fonseca (Mississauga East—Cooksville, Lib.)
We'll be moving on to the NDP for our last questions.
Ms. Hardcastle, go ahead.
November 21st, 2018 / 8 p.m.
Windsor—Tecumseh, NDP
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I'd like to hear a bit more about your support system and the information sharing in the medical community, the people you spoke to. It strikes me that each of you.... There's a saying that I see is true, that when you've seen one concussion, you've seen one concussion.
I know there are gaps in our understanding. Physical health.... A doctor is comfortable to help you with physical symptoms, and then for mental symptoms, it's another doctor. You have to go somewhere else. Did you compare notes with other families to see how you would find the doctor you ended up finding? What was your path to find that doctor?
You have to pay a little bit out of pocket for this doctor. This isn't something where the family doctor says, “Get some bedrest, and then go see this guy in a week.” How did you find him? I'm assuming there were other people with concussions in your life that you crossed paths with.
8 p.m.
As an Individual
It was our pediatrician, our family doctor, who brought up Dr. Lemmo. It was, “I've had some patients go to him. I'm not sure about what he does. I'm not sure if it works, but you can try him.” We were at the point of “What else can we do?” We had already tried going to the physiotherapist and the concussion therapy they had at that clinic, and that did not work.
After we had started to see Dr. Lemmo, we did talk to another girl whom Carly had known from grade school and who had actually seen him when she had a concussion, and we heard that it had worked. Once you start talking to people.... We spoke to a few people who had actually gone to him and had some good treatments with him as well.
Outside of Dr. Lemmo and his care, it was about trying to deal with the whole mental health problem separately as well. His focus was just dealing with the concussion part.
8:05 p.m.
Windsor—Tecumseh, NDP
How hard was it to have the mental health taken seriously?
Maybe I'm assuming what I shouldn't, but I know that with a young female concussion patient it could be “Oh, you're having mental health issues. It's the wrong time of the month” or “Teenage girls are moody.” Was that a problem? Once people knew there was a concussion or a head injury, was the mental health thing taken seriously? Did you feel people thought they were linked from the beginning, or did you have to convince them?
8:05 p.m.
As an Individual
I had to convince them. Part of it went back to the schooling, because even after she was back at school after her concussion, she still missed quite a bit of school. If she was having days when she was just feeling depressed and didn't want to go to school, I wasn't going to force her.
I would then go back to talk to the teachers. They were very good. The guidance counsellors were great. She had full access to the resource centre if she needed to. She was put on a plan at school, so when she was feeling stressed, she could just go there and she could do her testing there. They were accommodating. As I said earlier, there were a couple of teachers who just couldn't wrap their head around that piece of it.
8:05 p.m.
Mr. Peter Fonseca (Mississauga East—Cooksville, Lib.)
Thank you. That concludes our hearings.
We want to thank Carly and Sharra, and, in absentia, Rachel and Chris, who had to leave to catch a flight, as well as Mr. Dryden.
We're very proud of you. You were great witnesses. We as members get a chance to hear from many professional witnesses, and being able to come here.... We talked about your courage just for sharing your story. That will help so much with the work of this committee and the report that we'll put together.
Committee members, if you could just hold tight, we have a couple of motions to go through. I think everybody has gone through and looked at the budget..... Are you okay with it? There was also a motion for the communications plan. Is everybody okay with that? I'm seeing all heads nodding in the right direction. Excellent.
The meeting is adjourned.