On April 22, 2013, the Rotary Club of Sussex invited the Chamber of Commerce to hear guest Speaker Bob LeMieux.
A former National Hockey League (NHL) Vancouver Canucks player, Bob is colloquially known as "the only NHL hockey player that was knocked out in two different Madison Square gardens in the same year," according to his talk. Bob's message to the over twenty in attendance was on concussions and the effects concussions have on the children that are engaged in hockey and other contact sports...
Bob has been married for 51 years and has two children and seven grandchildren. He has lost 120 pounds as his addiction is food – this addiction is a side effect of a concussion. Bob had seven grade 2-3 concussions before the age of 23. Any concussion means there is some brain damage.
The highest incidences of concussions are in high school female soccer as the neck muscles in a female are not as strong as in a male. Some concussions go undiagnosed. A person only needs a slight bump or bang to have a concussion.
In 2002 to 2006 (4 year period), a Dr. Wayne Gordon conducted a study on every child in a special education class in the New York City area. Fifty percent of the children studied had some brain injury. Bob's goal is to call upon Rotary across Canada to put together an awareness program – 1 day or weekend session for the community on the need for attention to this.
Some of the ideas to reduce the frequency in hockey particularly included increasing the rink size, immediate suspensions of violence, get rid of the goons, take checking out of the game and train coaches differently. His proposal: let's design a model/forum to bring the community (health care, educators, parents) together to obtain knowledge. You can act upon the knowledge that you have gained.
When Bob dies, his brain will be donated to the Brain Injury Institute for further research. In June, Bob is going to have many tests completed on his brain to further the studies and results of concussions.
Bob fielded a number of questions from the group and gave a very powerful message. We thank him for his dedication to this research!