First-of-its-kind concussion center in Minnesota speeds up recovery, gets athletes back in the game faster

By Marielle Mohs

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    EDEN PRAIRIE, Minnesota (WCCO) — A concussion can sideline an athlete for weeks, but now Twin Cities Orthopedics (TCO) is taking a new approach to treatment.

TCO opened a new concussion specialty center in Eden Prairie last spring. Since opening, they’ve helped dozens of athletes get back in the game quicker, including 16-year-old Sawyer Danielson.

A concussion took the junior forward soccer player for St. Paul Academy out of the game right before her post-season this past fall.

“During the game I could kind of tell I wasn’t feeling right,” said Danielson.

She went to TCO’s Concussion Center and was immediately diagnosed with a concussion and had to sit out of her section games.

What makes the TCO Concussion Center unique is that it has everything a patient needs to recover from a concussion under one roof, and in recovery, timing is everything.

“The next visit may be 10 days down the road, so you come and see me, and then I might say, ‘Let’s set you up with physical therapy,’ and that may take another week. So you could delay things by twice as much,” said Dr. David Olson, a sports medicine doctor at TCO.

Olson is already using this technique as the Vikings team doctor. He can be seen on the field with players, like Justin Jefferson and Kirk Cousins, and a team of specialists, who can diagnose these NFL stars in minutes.

“If I’m with the Vikings, we have doctors, we have athletic trainers, we have physical therapists all work together as a team, and that’s what we do at the [Concussion] Center here as well,” said Olson.

TCO is also using virtual reality to help speed up the recovery. Eye-Sync is a tool they use to monitor patients’ eyes. Danielson relied on Eye-Sync to rebuild strength in her eye muscles, which were fatigued by her concussion.

“That really retrains the eyes to get back to their baseline, to a normal state, and that can be the thing that just gets you over the top and gets rid of your systems and gets you back to play,” said Olson.

During three visits to TCO over two weeks, and consistently doing her exercises at home, Danielson returned to the soccer field just in time for her team to compete in the state tournament.

“During that game, I couldn’t even imagine two weeks ago I had a concussion. I didn’t feel it at all and I just felt brand new,” said Danielson.

This renewed athlete took her talents to U.S. Bank Stadium in the state semi-finals and scored three goals in that game to win it for the Spartans.

Danielson’s team went on to win the State Championship title for the first time in school history for girls soccer, which was a memory she didn’t get to miss out on.

Daniel’s advice to the next athlete, taken out of the game from a concussion, is to trust the recovery process.

“It might not feel like it’s doing much at first, but know it is and you’ll be back before you know it,” said Danielson.

In addition to her first State Championship, Danielson also recently celebrated her D1 soccer commitment to the University of Minnesota.

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