Development of a Peer Education Program to Improve Concussion Knowledge and Reporting in Collegiate Athletes

A novel peer concussion-education program (PCEP) was developed to enhance concussion knowledge and reporting among collegiate student-athletes.

To describe the PCEP and its development and implementation.

Program development consisting of a literature review, focus group, and pilot implementation.

Athletics department at a college participating at the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division II-sanctioned competition level.

Fifteen student-athletes from the women's soccer and men's lacrosse teams participated in the focus group. Four peer concussion educators (PCEs) were debriefed after the pilot implementation of the PCEP with the women's soccer and men's lacrosse teams.

Focus-group data were analyzed qualitatively. The PCEs were debriefed, and responses were organized into recommendation types.

The literature review contributed information that supported the development of the PCEP's conceptual model. Focus-group results provided information used to train the PCEs and refine the PCEP's education modules. The pilot implementation and PCE debriefing supplied information used to further revise the education modules, PCE training, and PCEP implementation procedure.

The PCEP was developed based on the Theory of Reasoned Action and Planned Behavior and uses a peer-mediated, cognitive-behavioral, and interdisciplinary model to enhance concussion knowledge of and reporting by collegiate student-athletes. After a focus-group discussion and pilot implementation, we revised the PCEP and its education modules and developed an online manual to facilitate broad dissemination.