'Where's the trainer?': Push continues to get athletic trainers in Polk County public schools

November 26, 2024

in Industry,

Early through the fourth quarter on Friday night, Mulberry wide receiver Javonn Baptiste jumped high between two defenders to catch a pass before hitting the ground he landed and hitting his head on the ground for the second time in the game. Teammates quickly called for help, and Baptiste was surrounded by coaches and his mother, who was called to the field.

It was 9:15 p.m.

Missing from the group tending to the downed player was an athletic trainer.

Paramedics finally arrived at 9:30 p.m. and eight minutes later, Baptiste was taken to the hospital.

For Baptiste, it was just a matter of keeping him still until paramedics could stabilize his head for transport. This isn’t uncommon given the concern for concussions and neck injuries and athletes are often taken to the hospital as a precaution.

However, there can be many other situations that can arise, from broken bones to heat exhaustion involving not but players but even coaches, officials and even fans.

While a life-or-death situation rarely arises, there many injuries that are urgent and could benefit from having an athletic trainer on the scene, especially with broken bones.

It’s not uncommon for there not to be a trainer on hand at a high school athletic event in Polk County. In fact, it’s the norm. Only the private schools — Lakeland Christian, Santa Fe Catholic and All Saints — have a full-time athletic trainer and less than half the schools in the county will have an athletic trainer on hand at football games. Is that an untenable situation? To Sue Stanley-Green it is.

Stanley-Green, the former Athletic Training Education Program Director at Florida Southern College who now works for the Women’s Tennis Association, has been a long-time advocate of getting full-time athletic trainers in high schools.

“Only every single day for 20 years,” Stanley-Green said. “I worked with Bill Castle to try to get people covering at Lakeland, and he was a big supporter. But countywide, they wanted it, but it always came back to 'Well, we can’t afford it.' I was, 'Well, then you can't afford athletics if you can't afford somebody to take care of the student-athletes.' That was something that was a mission from when I first moved here.”

Stanley-Green has an ally in Polk County athletic director Dan Talbot.

“I usually speak at the coaches' clinics prior to the season, and Dan and I talk every year about what can we do,” she said. “What's going to happen, it's going to have something happen that there will be a death and then they'll say, 'Oh, well, we should have athletic trainers.'”

In Virginia in August, a football player collapsed and died during football practice and the school did not have an athletic trainer. NPR reported that there were seven deaths across the country in August in middle school or high school football.

Talbot is doing all he can to get athletic trainers into schools. Last year, the county was in a pilot program with Lakeland Regional where athletic trainers were supplied to George Jenkins and Kathleen. The athletic trainers worked 20 hours a week at the schools, attending practices and events.

The athletic trainers worked 20 hours a week at the schools, attending practices and events.

George Jenkins coach Paul Freeman raved about the program and how helpful it was to having an athletic trainer available.

"It's a tremendous help because it takes us (coaches) off that front line," he said. "The coaches were always the one checking injuries and having to be there for injuries. For years, I was like, guys, I've got a history and political science degree. I purposely did not take health and science classes, so it's funny the fact that I'm the first line of defense on an injury. So that's where I think it's really helped us a little bit. Give us some peace of mind, give us some expert, evaluations immediately. Obviously we can send them off to their doctors, but they lose two, three, four weeks and that could be there the rest of their senior year."

The program was expanded this year, and Talbot continues to work on improving the situation. The county appeared to be on the path of full-time athletic trainers at all public high schools until money, $3.72 million in 2018, was diverted to the school safety guardian program following the Parkland school shooting.

"We were looking at hiring full time trainers and was talking to the superintendent at the time," Talbot said. "And then unfortunately when the Stoneman Douglas (High School) thing happened, the law, we had to fund it, which is totally understandable. Safety has got to be paramount. So we're slowly getting there. We're catching up."

Benefits of Athletic Trainer

The most obvious benefit of having a trained medical professional at an athletic event in recent years came at a Santa Fe Catholic-Lakeland Christian baseball game in 2019. Santa Fe assistant coach Chuck Sticker collapsed in front of the dugout. While 911 was called, LCS athletic trainer Jordan Allen applied CPR and a defibrillator to Stickler, who was revived after a few seconds.

Allen has a picture with Stickler in his office at LCS as well as pictures on the wall of athletes who missed time with injuries and then returned. While it wasn’t a student-athlete involved, Allen said he’s often had to come to the aid of officials and fans at games he’s working.

On the field, Allen said that with some injuries, it can be important to have trained personnel on the scene quickly to prevent a more severe outcome from the initial injury.

“With compound fractures, all of those are emergencies and we’re going to call an ambulance, but we are able to apply a splint appropriately to make sure that we're, not causing any further harm,” Allen explained. “The longer a complex fracture like that — a compound fracture — stays out of place, the more likely... because those bones are jagged when they're broken and the tibia can get any of the arteries... you can lose blood flow to the distal extremities. That can cause in severe cases to have to amputate. So having a medical training professional like an athletic trainer on the sideline games, you can splint that. It takes maybe two minutes to four minutes to lose blood flow to body parts, and if you're waiting that long until the ambulance gets here that athlete could lose feeling and lose sensation and lose function of that limb in that time.”

The preventive care athletic trainers can provide is also extremely important. At LCS, Allen, who teaches two classes during the day, works with coaches in the preseason on specific exercises to help prevent injuries. His training room is busy right after school with athletes needing to get taped and attended to prior to practice.

While having an athletic trainer part-time or just at football games is better than nothing, the ideal, he says, is having one full-time.

“The gold standard would be full-time because you get to know our athletes,” Allen said. “If you're only there for games, they're going to only trust you so much. Being here all day, these athletes are coming in here, they're hanging out, we're developing a relationship. They can trust me. When you're able to spend time with them, they trust you. You’re able to communicate with the parents, and the parents understand where you're coming from. And also I'm able to have reports and relationships with team doctors and we're able to coordinate their care.”

Having an athletic trainer at the school can also be very beneficial in the rehab process.

“It’s just reassuring them this is normal with the healing process, like you're going to have some aches and pains, you might even have some setbacks,” Allen said. “That's normal. So being that person, not only to help them to the physical aspect of recovery, but also the mental.”

Lakeland Christian coaches certainly think it’s an advantage to have a full-time athletic trainer at the school, especially during the rehab process.

“Having somebody that's such an expert and is so good at rehabbing ,so when we get a girl that's injured, he puts them on the proper program and then he works with them every single day,” LCS girls soccer coach Jason Streets said. “And it just helps."

Three seasons ago, LCS soccer player Gretchen Caswell suffered a high ankle sprain and had to go to the hospital after the game, Street recalls.

"It was so bad. It was at the end of the season," Street said. "He (Allen) diligently, every single day, rehabbed her, strengthened her and got her back to us within three weeks by districts. And normally that's an injury that sidelines you for the rest of the year. So having him and having the school willing to spend so money, buying all the equipment and everything that we have so that he can treat these kids is priceless.”

Polk Partners with Lakeland Regional

The cost to bring athletic trainers to the public schools initially will be the cost of the salaries. Talbot estimated that the of the cost of having full-time trainers at the public high schools would be a little over $1 million a year for salaries.

While the equipment LCS has acquired over the 10 years he’s been at the school, like the cold tub, has made his job easier, all he used during his first four years, Allen said, was his hands.

“Most of the schools are going to have stuff you can work with,” said Allen. “As you’re building a program, that’s something you can get booster to donate to the school if there’s something (equipment) you don’t have. But you have ice machines, you have certain things. We were blessed that when got this facility, they donated a lot of equipment. … A lot of what we do, we do with our hands, massage therapy, manual therapy.

“What’s good about athletic trainers is they’re very adaptable. I worked a Division II college, and I had a lot of things at my disposal, but nothing compared to a D-I or professional. But at high school, they’re used to not working with a lot. High school athletic trainers are good at doing a lot with a little.”

Prior to the program with Lakeland Regional, the only public school that consistently had a certified trainer was Lake Region. JJ Blackburn taught at the school and coached cross country, track and boys soccer. But after last season, he moved on to become athletic director at McLaughlin.

Blackburn worked the football games and because of his certification, there was a certified athletic trainer at the events he coached even through he was there as a coach and not a trainer.

In Florida, it’s hit or miss around the state with some counties like Hillsborough, Palm Beach and Orange counties having athletic trainers in the public schools.

“There are pockets of Florida that are really, really strong,” Stanley-Green said. “Orlando has virtually athletic trainers in every school, and they have usually a second and maybe even a third athletic trainer. So 50 miles down the road, you see a really good model of that happening. The fact that it hasn't caught on here is just astounding.”

The program with Lakeland Regional Health initially was going to cost the schools money, but in email on the Athletic Trainer Program Pilot sent to schools on April 5, 2023, Lakeland Regional agreed to “remove the $20,000 year 2 cost.” The program started with athletic trainers at George Jenkins and Kathleen. The athletic trainer at Kathleen couldn’t finish the school year so the other split her time between the two schools, according to George Jenkins athletic director Jestin Bailey.

As far as Bailey was concerned, the part-time athletic was better than nothing. As a former wrestling coach, he especially liked having an athletic trainer on site at tournaments.

“It was a huge help,” he said. “Every wrestling tournament we host, there's an ambulance called. Every cross country or every track meet we host someone, passes out from heat exhaustion or trips or hits a hurdle or something. We're always calling an ambulance.”

Bailey said having a trainer at the wrestling tournaments wasn’t just a help to him but also provided peace of mind to the parents.

“It was a lot less worrisome because parents and teachers and everyone's always asking, 'Where's the trainer? Do you have a trainer? Where's the trainer?” he said. “That's every time we host something they're always asking. So I know that was the biggest relief this last time. Here's our trainer right here. We don't have to worry about all the parents being upset with us and complaining that there isn't a trainer.”

For the first-year program, there were no issues except for the one athletic trainer not being able to finish out the year.

“I didn't hear anything negative,” Talbot said. “It went well and that's why we're expanding it.”

This year, in addition to George Jenkins and Kathleen, the program expanded to Bartow and more schools have access to a trainer when needed.

"We have access now to Lakeland Regional where we can put in requests," Talbot said. We got the four schools that can put in request when they need coverage for sports."

Talbot said there are plans to work with hospitals in other part of the county to start a similar program for other county schools.

"Understand too is we're one of the very few counties that provides athlete insurance," Talbot said. "We'd love to have trainers but on the other hand, ywe provide athletic insurance, which doesn't cover everything, but to know that if an injury. does occur in a game, the district is providing insurance to help those medical costs, which is a huge expense. I don't know if that all happens with risk management and stuff. like that. because it's looped into other things. But we also have some positives. You look at other counties, they pay to play, to pay for the insurance and stuff like that. So, you know, it's one of the things, do you take away the insurance to find athletic trainers, or do you provide the insurance?"

Still, Talbot's goal is to have athletic trainers available at every high school. While Allen extolled the benefits of having a full-time athletic trainer on campus, everyone agrees having a one available at least part time at games and some practices is a positive start and is better than no trainers.

But when athletic trainers aren't there, coaches will remain the first responder when a players get injured.

“There’s a reason why state law requires coaches to be first-aid certified, CPR certified, AED (automated external defibrillator),” Talbot said. "That’s state law. Every paid coach. What coaches need to realize is that state law requires you to be trained to help students athletes in case of an emergency or injury.”

https://www.theledger.com/story/sports/high-school/2024/11/25/push-continues-to-add-athletic-trainers-at-polk-county-florida-public-schools/76268123007/

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