Palm Beach County OKs athlete registration forms without menstrual history questions
Palm Beach County school leaders on Wednesday approved a new process for registering students who play sports. The new paperwork no longer requires athletes to submit their entire medical history to their school and no longer asks students questions about their menstrual periods.
Both are changes made statewide by the Florida High School Athletic Association in the past year following an uproar from parents, doctors and advocates for data privacy and reproductive rights over the forms created and distributed by the FHSAA.
After an investigation by The Palm Beach Post in fall 2022 that alerted many to the questions about students' periods, Palm Beach County's school board called for the five questions to be removed from the FHSAA's annual registration forms. School boards from across the state, previously unaware of the questions, agreed with Palm Beach County.
More: Florida asks student athletes about their periods. Why some find it 'shocking' post-Roe
After extensive back-and-forth within the organization, FHSAA's board of directors voted in February to permanently remove the questions.
The organization also adopted other states' approaches to the athlete registration process that require students to turn in only a sign-off form from their doctor instead of the results of their full physical exam, which could contain sensitive medical information.
"I feel it is 100% medically necessary that we ask these questions. I do not, however, feel that it is medically necessary that our schools have access to this information," said Robert Sefcik, a member of the FHSAA's sports medicine advisory committee and executive director at the nonprofit Jacksonville Sports Medicine Program.
Palm Beach County's new policy now reflects that change.
More from February: FHSAA board OKs form asking athletes for sex at birth, scraps menstrual questions
What types of questions did a Florida athlete have to answer to register?
Florida student athletes have to answer more than three dozen questions with help from their doctors before they can be cleared to practice or play, including whether they have asthma, chronic illnesses, recently broken bones or chest pain during exercise.
But the FHSAA physical evaluation form had included five questions marked "for female athletes only" since at least 2002. Those questions were:
When was your first menstrual period?
When was your most recent menstrual period?
How much time do you usually have from the start of one period to the start of another?
How many periods have you had in the last year?
What was the longest time between periods in the last year?
Menstrual history is important information for pediatricians to know as they screen for bleeding and hormonal conditions that can cause complications for athletes. But in Florida, all of that medical data was then turned over to the athlete's school.
Although answering the questions was nothing new, athletes, their families and their doctors —prompted by The Post's investigation — began taking a closer look at where the information went after Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022 by the U.S. Supreme Court.
"I don’t see why (school districts) need that access to that type of information," said Dr. Michael Haller, a pediatric endocrinologist based in Gainesville.
"It sure as hell will give me pause to fill it out with my kid," he said of his own teenage children.
Florida was not unique in asking athletes about their menstrual cycles during their annual sports physicals.
As of March 2023, 35 states posed menstrual history questions to student athletes and required them to turn in the information to their schools to play. State athletic associations and school districts decide how those forms are stored.
Ten states — California, Colorado, Maryland, Minnesota, North Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin — instructed athletes not to turn in their medical history to their schools when they registered to play.
What did Gov. Ron DeSantis' office have to do with FHSAA decision to pull menstrual questions?
After parents and school districts raised concerns over the menstrual questions, the FHSAA's board of directors met in November and sent the issue to its sports medicine committee at the suggestion of Executive Director Craig Damon.
The sports medicine committee, which is made up of physicians, athletic trainers and at least one coach, decided instead to recommend that athletes be required to answer the questions and then to submit the information to their schools. Damon appeared to support the recommendation by planning to bring it to the board.
When the FHSAA's full board of directors met in February to consider the committee's recommendation, Damon abruptly changed his stance. Against the committee's suggestion, Damon instead recommended the questions be removed.
The board voted 14-2 to remove the menstrual questions and create the single-page sign-off sheet for athletes. The new form from the FHSAA also included a question about athletes' "sex at birth" instead of "sex," as the question was previously stated.
A review of emails by The Post found that the FHSAA's executive director was communicating with Gov. Ron DeSantis’ office less than a week before its board removed the questions.
Damon traded emails and phone calls about the FHSAA’s annual registration forms with Alex Kelly, DeSantis’ deputy chief of staff, early on a Saturday morning, Feb. 4.
That same day, he removed the questions from a proposed draft of the form.
Katherine Kokal is a journalist covering education at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her at kkokal@pbpost.com. Help support our work, subscribe today!
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Florida school board OKs athletic forms without menstrual question
