Franklin Regional Grad Takes Over Independence Concussion Management Program

Trib Live: When Alex Fleming was helping the Franklin Regional Panthers football team win the PIAA’s 2005 AAA championship, he wasn’t thinking much about concussion protocol.

But as the 2007 Franklin Regional graduate moved on to Davidson College — where he played football while pursuing a biology degree before earning his medical degree from the Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine — concussions began to occupy a much more central role in discussions about athletes’ well-being.

Two years after Fleming graduated, the National Football League barred defenders from using their helmets, forearms or shoulders to make contact with the head or neck area of a defenseless receiver, a rule that was expanded the following year in 2010.

Fleming recently took over the concussion management program for the Independence Health system. He follows in the footsteps of longtime program head Dr. Jim Masterson, who died in July 2023.

“He taught me a lot of things I didn’t know and really put this clinic into a respectable place,” he said. “He put the ImPACT testing and a lot of other tools in place and showed me how they can really help patients.”

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