Dr David Munro | Concussion practitioner and co-founder of Concussion Passport (16.04.26)

0:00Well, as concussion becomes a bigger issue in global sport, it does so to add a country, whether it's football, whether it's cricket, whether it's rugby, whether it's soccer, juniors, seniors, girls and boys, it's a big issue. Now, Mike and Cushion Passport provides uniformity for schools, parents, clubs and clinicians. Dr David Munro is a co-founder and he joins me this morning. David, welcome to Waitley. Good morning, Tom. Thanks for having me, Tom. David, tell us what Mike and Cushion Passport is. Tom, it's basically what it says on the packet, I suppose. We identified this gap in athlete well-being and care where athletes were being concussed on a weekend sport, for example, and then turning up to school on the Monday, and the silos that exist between clubs, foreign schools, not talking to each other, and not transferring that really important information across on a real-time basis. So Mike and Cushion Passport sits with the athlete and it travels

1:02with the athlete. So it's a concussion history that allows the athlete and the clubs and schools involved to get real-time access to their concussion information to make sure that they're safe and able to return to play and training. Tell us when and how the idea was born. It's interesting. It's been asked for by a number of international and national organisations for a few years now, and there's a group of us that I can also put my parent hat on as well as my clinician hat on it, and we saw it as a gap in the in the healthcare provision of three young athletes. So a group of us got together and thought we no one's building this, so we thought this is a great idea to sort of fill that need as being asked for at various levels, national and internationally. In your experience and clearly concussion is becoming more of an issue because I guess there's more awareness around it and more safety nets involved. How serious is the is concussion at a community level and how much was it being ignored by

2:05excuse me, coaches and parents and people around it? Look, when we think about who plays sport and we all love watching our internet, our elite sport, but the majority of sports players play that grass roots and community level and that's what we're sort of addressing. The vast majority of athletes are playing at that level, they play because they love playing. I think coaches and parents, I'm not sure they're necessarily ignoring it, they're just not sure what to do about it. It's a big, we all know it's a big problem we see it in the new cycle, you know, just very recently with class actions and insurance clients and changes in that space as well. And I think people particularly at that grass roots and community level are really asking for a very simple solution and a lot of this has been driven by some feedback from school nurses, for example, who or the volunteer team managers at Junior Sports who spend Friday night chasing emails and medical clearances, you know, can just play a play on the weekend. I haven't got my clearance form. How long have they been out for? So it's very much addressed at

3:07that that grass roots community level to make it easier for them to navigate this safe, you know, return of their players and just knowing instantly whether they're clear to play or whether they haven't been clear to play by their doctor at the stage. Nothing is more simple than a traffic light system. Tell us about the traffic light system involved here. It is a traffic light system Tom and that we're trying to make it as simple as possible. It is sort of tech based in terms of it's all done and we're trying to get rid of that paper trial. So it exists as a traffic light system if all athletes are hopefully is green so they're non-concast and they're safe to play. If something happens during a game or in another event it might be combat sports or horse riding or mountain biking. If something happens and there's a suspected concussion that athlete moves from green to amber. At that point they're not diagnosed with concussion. They're just sort of sitting on the sideline which follows the international guidelines of if and doubt sit them out and wait for them to be assessed by someone who's appropriately trained. That athlete then attends their local doctor or who they need to see and they're at this stage. We're not telling

4:13the health care practitioner how to how to complete their assessment. We're just asking for the doctor's complete assessment. Once they've made that decision the my concussion path for athlete generates a single use QR code. The doctor uses that to then move the athlete from amber back to green. They might say look we're going to clear this player. We don't think it was concussion or if it was they move into the red and that's instantly updated back to the dashboard of whichever club or school that athletes involved in and they're unable to be selected. Once that athlete has gone through the protocols they return back to the doctor. The doctor does their thing, clears them from red back to green. That's instantly updated onto the passport, updated onto the dashboard and the volunteer team manager or the school nurse or the whoever's involved, the trainer or the physios who were involved in managing that athlete can see straight away. They've been cleared back to green and they're clear to play. The big part about this is we're seeing it with insurance companies at the moment. It's reducing that liability and risk

5:16that we see. There's nothing worse than putting an athlete back onto the field or to the wherever form they're going back into play and if they haven't been cleared properly, that organisation are at risk. We're really trying to reduce that risk profile and just make it simple. Nothing's more simple and traffic lights system. Tell us about the confidentiality component to this as well. I'd imagine there'd be kids and probably more so kids than adults who play sport for three, four, five different clubs, schools, maybe parents who are separated as well. How important is that component? It's probably the first thing we looked at is confidentiality and there's others where it's installed, who's looking at it. The simple thing about this and the beauty of it I think is that we're not asking for any medical information at all. It's just a clearance. It's replacing the medical certificate that people walk out of a doctor's office with and then take a photo of and text it to their trainer or the team manager. The medical notes are very separate to this. It's purely a notification platform that allows people to see

6:21quickly the status of that athlete. I think it's an amazing initiative and something that parents and really all community athletes should be using around the country. How can they get access to it? Well, it's absolutely free for parents and athletes at the moment and it always will be. So when we set this up and again, put my parents hat on, we want to remove any barriers to this, if you're managing community sport and a lot of people are volunteers in that space, no fear in that space myself, we're busy during the week and then your mind turns to weekend sport with your kids or you might be managing a amateur football club or a motor cross club or combat sports club, for example, we're trying to remove all those barriers. So we'll always be free for parents and athletes and they can simply go to myconcussionpassport.com.au. Logon, we've got a great tech support that sits there that just makes it as easy as possible for people to develop their own digital passport. That then travels with them and this is the other thing

7:23time that we really like about it. The travels with them for life, so let's take a school-age person, they're playing club sport, they might move, so school sport, they might move to club, they might change clubs, they might change regions, they might change leagues, that information will travel with them. So if then, for example, if I put my clinician hat on, I have an athlete come to see me, I can pull up their passport and have a look at their concussion history. So we can sort of help them through that process as well to make sure that they're as safe as possible and looking after their brain health through myconcussionpassport.com.au. Such an important area, so significant now in the current landscape that we're in and myconcussionpassport.com.au, as you said, is the website. David, really appreciate your time and well done on this. Thanks for your interest. It's a nice people's solution and we're just hoping people get on board and use it as we launch into the winter sports season, which we're all looking forward to. Awesome. Dr. David Monroe joining us from myconcussionpassport.