This week’s best of MomsTeam.com, a website that focuses on health and safety for youth sports:

* Despite the popularity of energy drinks, especially among teens, both the National Federation of State High School Associations and American Academy of Pediatrics strongly recommend against their consumption by children and adolescents because of their potential adverse health effects. MomsTEAM’s Senior Health and Safety Editor Lindsay Barton and sports hydration expert, Susan Yeargin, PhD, ATC, answered the most frequently asked questions about the popular beverage.

* If you have a child playing winter sports, chances are your calendar is already chock full of regular season and holiday tournaments. A new study shows that nutrition often takes a back seat to convenience during tournament play. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Sports nutritionist, Susan Nelson, Sc.D, RD offered some strategies to help parents make healthy choices at fast food, family-style and ethnic restaurants, and grocery and convenience stores when traveling for sports this winter.

* Most student-athletes who suffer concussions recover within a week to 10 days, but for some symptoms take much longer to go away. Now researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center have found that amantadine – a drug originally developed as a medication used to treat or prevent illness caused by the flu virus, and later shown to improve symptoms of Parkinson’s disease and cognitive function in patients with serious brain, spinal cord, or nerve-related illnesses and injuries – may be useful in treating adolescents with post-concussion syndrome. Dr. William P. Meehan III, Director of the Sports Concussion Clinic at Children’s Hospital Boston and author of Kids, Sports, and Concussion reported on this promising development.

* If your child has ever twisted their ankle playing basketball, had their hand stepped on during a football game, or been kicked in the shin playing soccer, you probably already know about the swelling that occurs after a sports injury. Swelling is actually one of the ways the body protects an injured area against further damage in the immediate aftermath of an injury. The combination of restricted motion, pain, and generally ill feeling will likely take an athlete off the playing field, and, sometimes, on to a physical therapist’s treatment table. Physical therapist Keith Cronin, DPT said there are a number of factors that should be considered in deciding whether a young athlete can return to sports if swelling is still present.

– MomsTeam.com and NFLEvolution.com