Subcommittee on Sports-Related Concussions in Canada Committee on Nov. 28th, 2018

[Kathy Leeder]

You have to place a lot of responsibility on them. They're the ones who run the game. They're the ones who charge the fees. They're the ones who have the expertise. They're the ones who can engage the parents, find coaches or hire trainers, and provide the expertise so that people are wearing the proper equipment. They know the game. They're the experts.

[Ash Kolstad]

Yes, it's important. My impression is that the sporting organizations are trying to follow what the research shows. It's crucial that they partner with research institutes to test out whether the changes they want to make are actually effective.

[The Chair]

We're going to be moving over to the Liberals again, and Mr. Darren Fisher.

[Darren Fisher]

Thank you again, Mr. Chair.

You're all such excellent advocates, and this is going to increase awareness. Just talking about this and having things like this televised is going to increase awareness for concussions.

I keep thinking about the comments about the smaller towns and the minor hockey associations, and how there's nobody really around when something like that happens. Someone will just say to wake him up every hour. I think it might have been Anne who said that.

I think about the level of support, knowledge and technology at the higher levels. As I said last week when Mr. Dryden was here, we have to find a way to filter that down, either through training or....

Anne, you were talking about equipment and the $1,000 helmet. You said, “I would gladly spend the money to keep him safe.” What a great lesson. My son plays competitive hockey, so I try to buy the best helmet. I assume that the highest price tag is the best helmet. I will say that I really hadn't considered that it wasn't until you said that. It's astonishing.

However, I will say we can't have the sports stores held to having that ability to.... We expect someone who's fitting our kids with shoulder pads to know what size, but we really can't put the onus on them for that.

Somebody said something about CSA. Maybe we need to get to a higher standard. I come from the era of the old Jofa helmet, which looked like a cardboard box. It's much, much better than it was, but the players are bigger, stronger and faster, and they're hurling themselves at each other because, as Matthew said, kids look up to the NHL players and play the game the way those players play it. That seems to be the way it is.

Maybe we need to get to a higher standard. You made a lot of recommendations and I didn't get them all jotted down, but if you are able and you want to submit them to us in a list form, I know it's very important that we hear your suggestions. I know I'm mixing up everybody's testimony because it's all coming at us, but I like the idea of maybe a higher test than being CSA-approved.

I looked at my helmet the other day, since being named to this committee, and it said 2009. That's gentlemen's hockey, and I'm more likely to do damage to myself by falling into the boards than being pushed, but my 2009 helmet is no longer good by 2012 standards.

There's a lot we can learn here. If you have recommendations and you want to throw them out there, that would be great.

I'm sorry, that wasn't really a question, Anne. I was just commenting on some of the things you said. You also implied that when Carter was first diagnosed with a concussion, you realized that he may have had several more before then, but you just thought they were headaches.

[Anne Phair]

Yes.

He started playing midget AAA away from home when he was actually only 14 years old, which broke my heart to see him leave home at that age. That year he was wearing that helmet that shouldn't have been used past bantam. He complained of headaches all the time. No one on the team clued in that he had a concussion. His dad and I didn't even clue in. We actually chalked it up to homesickness and being away from home.

Now looking back we wonder if he didn't have a concussion for most of that year. He was frequently taking shots to the head in practice. We did actually go to the team about that and say, look, this has to stop, look at the marks on his helmet. Even on the back of his helmet there were puck marks where there isn't enough protection for sure. They didn't do anything about it.

[Darren Fisher]

You talk about the competition running and crashing into the net and things like that with Carter. You said there were suspensions, but the suspensions were never enough to change behaviour. Were they three games, six games, two games, or does it matter? Does it matter if there's a head hunter out there?

Did we lose you, Anne? We lost her.

[Anne Phair]

I'm still here. Carter is speaking. I couldn't hear him.

[Darren Fisher]

Sorry.

Was Carter talking?

[Anne Phair]

Yes.

As far the suspensions went they started off with the three-game suspension. The next one I believe went to six. The next one went to eight games. The one that finally did him in for good was I believe six games for the player and three for the coach.

These were one month apart. Our league was also notorious for not putting these suspensions out there for everybody to see. The teams knew what happened but the general public didn't really know anything about it.

[The Chair]

Thank you.

We're going to move over to the NDP and Ms. Hardcastle.

[Cheryl Hardcastle]

Thank you.

My understanding just a minute ago is that, Carter, you were making some comments. They're not on the record. We didn't hear you. If you said something just a minute ago, could you repeat it?

Before your mom spoke, we thought it was a moment of silence. If you did say something, there was a misunderstanding and we need to hear you repeat it please.

[Carter Phair]

I don't think the suspensions were enough. In one of them, as is the case with most of them, it was an attempt to either win the game or keep their season alive. At the end of the day, everyone just wants to win and keep playing.

[Cheryl Hardcastle]

Okay. Thank you.

I guess you all know that this is a subcommittee of the health committee. We have heard a little bit about, yes, you can get concussions from a variety of different sports. As a matter of fact, we probably know that a brain injury like this can come from a variety of different activities and accidents.

That being said, think about our role here and the federal government's role in what you would see as helping to address the effects of concussions. What we've heard so far from witnesses previously is that there is a gap in understanding between the physical and mental in the brain injury.

Maybe you could just share a little bit about your experiences, and say what different paths we should be going down and exploring in terms of your experience.

I don't know who wants to go first. Anne...?

[Anne Phair]

I don't think I have anything new to add other than I think that leagues need to put it out there that there's proper equipment and have someone who is trained to identify the proper equipment. On the suspensions, I think the league rules need to change in order to protect these kids. I think the aftercare needs to come into it as well.

It should be, yes, you quit, but we're not done with you.

[Cheryl Hardcastle]

Exactly.

I think you were telling us that you went—a lot of the onus was on you—to find this doctor. I think you said he was in Victoria.

[Anne Phair]

In Burnaby....

[Cheryl Hardcastle]

You went to find this doctor. I'm just assuming you were surprised that these kinds of doctors are so few and far between.

[Anne Phair]

I was absolutely shocked.

[Cheryl Hardcastle]

You took this initiative. Did your family doctor recommend that you find this doctor, or did you go on the Internet yourself?

[Anne Phair]

We were strictly on our own. There wasn't a single person involved in hockey who could give us any advice.

With his last concussion, he was ambulanced to Saskatoon hospital for a CT scan to make sure he didn't have a brain bleed because of some recent symptoms. No one gave us anything in the medical community or in the hockey community. We were on our own 100%.

[The Chair]

That concludes our second round.

We do have some time. If members have one question they would like to ask of the witnesses, this is an opportunity to do so. I'll just go around the table.

Ms. Hardcastle.

[Cheryl Hardcastle]

Matthew or Kathy or Ash, I'm wondering if you want to expand on those comments about how you had to go and find your treatment for the brain injury aspect.

[Matthew Chiarotto]

With my concussion, as soon as I went to the bench there was a lot of conflicting opinions. The immediate reaction wasn't, “Oh, you have a concussion.” It was, “Can you go back out? Are you okay?”

I think my mom can explain from the parental view some of the conflicting information she received.

[Kathy Leeder]

With Matthew's first concussion, we had very few resources. It was the Internet and that's not a good source of information.

When Matthew had his second concussion, the Greater Toronto Hockey League had partnered with Holland Bloorview, so we had resources to go to. We weren't grabbing everything off the Internet, trying to find what made sense to us, and placing it on our kid. We were informed. We knew symptoms. We knew that it was going to be different, that things can come and go, and that symptoms don't even show up right away. They can show up a couple of days later. For us, the big difference was having the care. I mean, it really isn't acceptable for anybody to have to deal with this on their own, using the Internet as their source of information.

I like what Ash had to say about research. There are a lot of great research studies going on right now for youth in sports, trying to pull it together, and I think that's something that should continue. There's that whole component of mental health that even on Matthew's second concussion we didn't get into. There's a whole element where the person does feel trapped. They lose all their support network. The mental health component of it is very key as well.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Ms. Leeder.

I believe Mr. Kitchen has a question.