How many athletes are playing on break away bases right now?

		Use of breakaway bases like these saves $2 billion in health care costs each year.

I'd say right now, 15% of fields in our country have breakaway bases. The companies that make these safer products are smaller companies. The big companies pay for a lot of advertising. Here's an example: Little League Baseball has been playing with Rogers breakaway bases for the last 10 years. But, if you go to Little League baseball site, and go to products, and look up bases, you are not going to find that type of breakaway base under recommended products. Why? Because the Rogers Base Company didn't pay an endorsement fee to little league baseball.

Where does MLB stand now on the breakaway base issue?

They still don't have breakaway bases. They will tell you that the pros don't need them, and I will tell you, you can look up and down teams' rosters this past year and find significant injuries related to sliding that could have been prevented.

There are differences amongst breakaway bases. We found the the Rogers Breakaway bases, the kind that are like Legos, will reduce injuries by 96%. But, magnetic and Velcro are unstable. Dirt and water get in between them and alters how they break apart, potentially leading to more injuries, not fewer.

What's another injury you've worked to prevent?

Over the last 28 years, more than 70 student athletes have been hit in the chest with a baseball, lacrosse ball or hockey puck and have died. No one knew what was going on. We're talking about 3 kids a year. That's 3 too many.

The folks who were doing the best research in chest impact injuries was General Motors' research labs in Warren, Michigan, about an hour from where we are. I talked to the principal research scientist at General Motors, Dave Viano, who's been a very, very important person in the development of the Institute and in our studies. I said, "You guys are doing great research in airbag research and chest impact injury research and we need your help." And this is how simple it was: He said, "Ok. What can we do?"

		This three-part, "Lego-type" base breaks into pieces when struck.

I almost fell off the chair. Nothing's ever been that simple dealing with the Institute. We talked, and he combined his researchers and research teams with what we had at the Institute and we utilized their labs initially at General Motors and we did studies.

Now, this was the early 1990s, and there were a lot of advertisements saying that if your child used softer, heavier baseballs or used chest protectors, your child won't get hurt or die. Some of the manufacturers had gone so far as putting the names of kids that had died in the ad, saying that if they had used these products they'd be alive today.

What's been found in airbag research and in chest impact research with the Justice Department is that how lethal a hit is depends on how far and how fast the chest caves in. So we compared these standard hard baseballs with these softer, heavier baseballs that are supposedly protective, and these chest protectors. The softer, heavier baseballs and the chest protectors offered no statistically significant protection. Some of the products made the problem worse.

We took all our data to the Consumer Products Safety Commission. He went through it for over a month, and they said, "This really affects the public health, get it out there." So we went to a peer review journal, and it was published.

Some manufacturers threatened GM and us with lawsuits. But some manufacturers said "Ok, what do we do to make things better?" And parents and coaches thanked us. So, my book is a guide to make every family in our country safer. And they will save our country billions of dollars in health care.

So number one, let's be aware this problem exists. Three kids a year are going to go down. Number two. Lighter mass baseballs make a difference. Not softer, heavier, but lighter mass. Three, teach the kids how to get out of the way of the pitch. Teach the fundamentals so they're not walking into the pitch. Number four. If this event happens, a defibrillator is the best way to pull somebody out of this. Because there is no product that I am aware of- lighter weight baseballs, chest protectors, either old or new- that has been shown to prevent this problem 100% of the time. So we educate folks about the problem. Finally if it does occur, make sure that coach knows CPR and make sure that that external defibrillator is available.
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Images: Rogers USA, Inc.