baseline neurocognitive testing

A greater proportion of baseline neurocognitive test results for pre-high school athletes are invalid, particularly when they are tested in large group setting. The results are a warning, say experts, that computerized baseline testing programs for younger athletes will require even greater vigilance, caution, individualized attention, and administrative resources than testing among older athletes.

The use of baseline and postconcussion computerized neurocognitive testing has become an increasingly common practice in the assessment and management of concussions at the college, high school, and even youth level. But, as three new studies show, obtaining baseline test results reflecting a valid assessment of an athlete's "true" baseline ability needed for comparison to postinjury performance is fraught with challenges.

Adolescent athletes with a history of multiple concussions perform just as well on brief computerized tests of neurocognitive function than those without such history, although those who a history of two or more concussions self-reported more concussion symptoms, says a new study.

Athletes who didn't get enough sleep the night before undergoing baseline concussion testing didn't perform as well as expected, say researchers presenting their work at the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine's 2013 Annual Meeting in Chicago, IL.

Outsmarting or "sandbagging" a baseline neuropsychological test is much harder than an athlete may think, say two recent studies, because they are programmed to automatically "flag" test protocols that seem suspicious.

Along with studies reporting high concussion rates, increased concussion awareness among athletes, parents, coaches and health care providers, and new state concussion safety laws has come rapid growth in the use of computerized neuropsychological testing in evaluating and managing sports concussions, particularly at the college and high school levels. The problem, says sports concussion neuropsychologist, Rosemarie Scolaro Moser, Ph. D, is that obtaining a valid baseline test result can be a challenge, especially for youth athletes.