coachKidsSports.com

The score is 2-1 late in the game.  Your team is down, but pressing hard.  The kids are making great passes — short and quick, just as you taught them — and advancing through the defenders easier than they walked through the cones at the first practice.  You know it’s only a matter of time before you tie the score, and you know in your bones that the go ahead goal will come even easier.

Then it happens, Jenny strips the ball from the other team’s best player.  She pivots and looks down the wing for Ashley.  Ashley sees the play develop and starts sprinting down the sideline, careful to stay onsides.  Five steps into her burst, she stops short.  She can’t breathe, she’s having an asthma attack.

According to an article in a recent edition of the Chicago Sun-Times, most coaches are unprepared to handle an athlete experiencing an asthma attack.  The article quotes a study from the Chicago Asthma Consortium that only 1 in 3 coaches has the training to handle an attack.  The article doesn’t state what constitutes the training, but it does offer some common sense tips to keep your kids healthy and safe…

• Preventing attacks. Remind asthmatic athletes to use rescue inhalers before starting aerobic activities, if so directed by their doctors. Ask a parent or athlete for a copy of the athlete’s asthma action plan.
• Recognizing an attack. Symptoms vary, and can include coughing, chest pain or tightness, shortness of breath, wheezing, pale skin and speaking in short bursts.
• During an attack, never leave an athlete alone; have someone else get the parent. The athlete generally should take two puffs of the rescue inhaler and hold breath for 10 seconds after each puff. Wait one to two minutes between puffs. The athlete should sit up and breathe slowly through the nose, and out through pursed lips.

In Chicago, the lung association offers a free one-hour asthma classes for coaches and teachers at their offices at 1440 W. Washington. You can call (312) 628-0206 for scheduling. For online training go to www.WinningWithAsthma.org for a 30-minute training session.

This is a serious issue affecting nearly every team.  The number of children with asthma is staggering.  Few are at serious risk, but it’s impossible to know when a major attack can occur.  But understanding the warning signs can prevent a tragedy.