Treatment Decisions in Pediatric Sports Medicine: Do Personal and Professional Bias Affect Decision-Making?

BACKGROUND: Personal and professional biases can affect decision-making regarding important issues in pediatric sports medicine. Gaining insight into the opinions of health care professionals who specialize in pediatric sports medicine will provide information that may be useful for directing ongoing research in this field. HYPOTHESIS: It was hypothesized that surgeons would demonstrate bias toward early surgical intervention versus nonsurgeons. In addition, it was hypothesized that youth sports medicine professionals who were parents of a child with a previous major sports injury or concussion would be less likely to allow their child to play American tackle football or return to football after a concussion. STUDY DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. METHODS: An online survey was provided to the active members of the Pediatric Research in Sports Medicine Society. We used both professional background information and responses to questions related to personal experiences with youth sports injuries to determine potential factors associated with underlying biases. Survey responses among subgroups were compared using the Fisher exact test. The Pearson correlation coefficient was used to evaluate years in practice versus opioid use. RESULTS: Of the survey participants, 62.5% were pediatric surgeons, and 37.5% represented different nonsurgical youth sports medicine professions. Surgeons were less likely than nonsurgeons to agree to allow their child to return to football after sustaining a concussion and completing a concussion protocol (48% vs 76%, P = .013). Surgeons were more likely than nonsurgeons to agree to both elective shoulder stabilization after a first-time dislocation and elective drilling of a stable knee osteochondritis dissecans (OCD) before nonoperative treatment (41% vs 10%, P = .003 and 52% vs 23%, P = .013, respectively). Those who reported having a child with a concussion history were more likely to support him or her returning to football after a concussion (65% vs 33%, P = .026). CONCLUSION: Surgeons were more likely to favor elective shoulder-stabilization surgery after a first-time dislocation and drilling of a stable knee OCD instead of nonoperative management. Personal experience of having a child who sustained a major sports injury or concussion did not demonstrate a bias against participation in football or return to football after a concussion.