Pop Warner Administrators and Football Coaches:

We’re happy to help provide data to Dr. Dawn Comstock who’s doing a survey on football injuries at Middle School level.  We sincerely hope that your Midget or Unlimited teams will participate since, among other things, we hope it will provide a comparison of our age/weight-based system compared to age/grade-only systems of play.

We encourage you to sign on and to be thorough in your participation.  Please remember that it pertains only to our Midget and Unlimited Divisions...and please note that your Pop Warner Association will receive a donation for your participation!

This survey will benefit all of us.  Thanks for your help!

Jon Butler, Executive Director

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2011-2012 Youth Football RIO Study Details

As a potential contact person for a Pop Warner football team, I am contacting you today to invite you to participate in the 2011-2012 RIO Study, an internet-based surveillance study of injuries sustained by middle school aged football players. This study is being conducted by researchers at The Ohio State University, College of Medicine and College of Public Health and The Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, Center for Injury Research and Policy. Take the Survey

This study has been generously funded by a grant provided by NFL Charities (NFL CHARITIES AWARDS MORE THAN $1.6 MILLION IN SPORTS MEDICAL RESEARCH GRANTS)

As the number of Pop Warner football participants increases over time, so do the number of injuries sustained by middle school aged athletes.  By participating in this project, you can help us learn more about how middle school aged football players are injured so we can determine the best way to protect them from being hurt. The injury information collected will provide a basis for recommendations to reduce the number of middle school football-related injuries.

This research project uses RIO (Reporting Information Online), an internet-based surveillance system, to collect data from a national sample of Pop Warner football participants to identify rates and patterns of injury and to identify risk and protective factors for sports injuries at the middle school level. The surveillance system being used in this study was modeled after the successful National Collegiate Athletic Association Injury Surveillance System (NCAA ISS) and High School RIO, systems that consistently produce high quality data on sports-related injuries, exposures, and risk factors among collegiate and high school athletes.

As a participant in the 2011-2012 Middle School RIO Study, you will receive a monetary incentive of $200 as well as some concussion information materials to thank you for your participation in the surveillance study. 

If you and your team would like to participate in the 2011-2012 Middle School RIO Study or if you simply want additional information about this important project, please click on the following link:

http://survey.nchri.org/TakeSurvey.aspx?SurveyID=884Hnl8

Thank you for your time.  We look forward to working with you!  Also, please feel free to forward this invitation to any other Pop Warner teams who may be interested in participating.