Australian Football League concussion guidelines: what do community players think?

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Preventing concussion in sport is a global challenge. To assess community-level adult male Australian Football players' views on following the Australian Football League's (AFL) concussion guidelines. METHODS: 3 focus groups, each comprising 6 players from 1 regional league, were conducted until saturation of issues raised. Discussions followed a semistructured script and were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. Thematic analysis was conducted by 2 coders independently. RESULTS: Identified advantages of the guidelines included highlighting the seriousness of concussion; changing the culture around playing with concussion and shifting return-to-play decision responsibility fr..