Dr. Shelina Babul works in the Department of Pediatrics at UBC’s Faculty of Medicine. She also specializes in sports injury at BC Children’s Hospital.
Her work has put her on the receiving end of an increasing number of calls from concerned parents of kids who have suffered a concussion.
That’s the good news: parents are becoming more aware and more concerned about their kids’ head injuries.
The bad news is that Dr. Babul has identified a disturbing lack of consistency in the way concussions are being diagnosed and managed.
“A lot of physicians,” for example, “think you have to lose consciousness to have a concussion, but that only happens in 10% of cases,” says Dr. Babul.
To bring healthcare professionals up to speed, Dr. Babul and a team from BC Children’s Hospital have created a tool to help standardize concussion awareness and care.
The Concussion Awareness Training Toolkit – CATT – is a website hosting a 40-minute online course about concussions. CATT’s primary purpose is to update the knowledge base, attitudes, and practices of health care professionals.
In its first five weeks, CATT received 1,500 hits. Further growth is likely as Dr. Babul is promoting the website across Canada to medical associations and concussion groups.
The next step for Dr. Babul’s team is to develop CATT for two additional audiences. One section will promote concussion care for teachers, and another will be targeted at parents, coaches and players.
It’s important that everyone is on the same page about concussion care. CATT is a great way to get us there.
For More Information:
- Shining a light on the “black box” of concussions, UBC Faculty of Medicine
- CATT
