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Concussions in Sports

Concussions in Sports
Garrett Streich
Shepherd University
August 4, 2015 (Summer III 2015)

Abstract

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Concussions in Sports

Concussions have been a growing concern, in many contact sports, the most common ones today
would be football and professional fighting. Not many people are informed of the effects to come
from not fully treating/recovering from a concussion. Athletes have chosen to continue to play
through a concussion and it has proven to push them to have psychological illnesses. Many cases
of suicide have been associated with athletes suffering from mental illnesses and for professional
football players, it is related to long-term effects of suffering multiple concussions. Concussions
have been a growing problem with contact sports, it can also be a way of bringing careers to an
end. This paper is intended to enlighten athletes on the reasons to become aware of concussions
and the short and long-term effects and why this is not an injury to take for granted.

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Table of Contents

Introduction.Pg. 4
Research.Pg. 6
Conducting Study.......Pg. 9
Conclusion.Pg. 11
References..Pg. 12

Introduction

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Concussions in Sports

A concussion is a mild traumatic brain injury, and are a consequence of

a direct or indirect blow that results in a sudden angular acceleration or
deceleration of the brain tissue within the caldarium. In the US, concussions
have become very common is sports, such as football, basketball, hockey,
rugby, soccer, or any other contact sport. Symptoms or concussions are loss
of consciousness, headache, dizziness, amnesia, nausea, confusion, fatigue,
sleep disturbance, balance and memory impairment, slurred speech, and
light sensitivity. As concussions have grown to be more and more common
they are looking for more ways to prevent concussions from happening.
Along with trying to prevent concussions from happening, studies have been
done to show that individuals who suffer symptoms or suffer from a
concussion should fully heal before they go back to participating in any
physical activity. If an individual suffers multiple concussions during the
recovery period they could have further psychological issues or illnesses.
Although there have been studies going on for years and the topic of
concussions is continued to be studied, there is still more research that has
to be done in order to try and prevent concussions and also figure out a way
to fully clear an individual that suffered a concussion. I am conducting this
research because I have found it interesting that in the world of profession
sports owners and coaches say they care about the health of their players,
but in reality all they care about is getting players back out in the game
whenever they suffer an injury. Many NFL players suffer concussions, this has
been going on for years, what they do is they take a few days off and the

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next week they are back on the field playing. What needs to be done is
research for a more exact way to test for the full recovery of a concussion.
Not only is it an issue for athletes to have suffer a blow to the head while
recovering, but it has been suggested that reoccurring blows to the head can
cause psychological illnesses. A few athletes have had early deaths from
reoccurring blows to the head, for example Junior Seau, a retired linebacker
from the NFL, committed suicide form the mental effect of receiving so much
head trauma. Another athlete that just retired from the 49ers is Chris
Borland, retiring at the age of 24 concerned about his health after repetitive
head injuries. There have also been 70 other cases of former players that
have been diagnosed with progressive neurological disease after their deaths, and
numerous studies have shown connections between the repetitive head trauma associated with
football, brain damage and issues such as depression and memory loss. Another very familiar
athlete that has suffered the long-term effect of multiple head injuries is Muhamad Ali, which is
one of the more well-known figures that is more common when this field is brought up.
With concussions being such a common injury, all athletes should have more knowledge
of the symptoms and what the severity is with these injuries. Athletes should become more
aware of what can happen if returning too soon to a sport or not receiving the proper treatment.
This will hopefully help reduce the number of concussions and head injuries or at least prevent
them from reoccurring and taking longer to recover. If athletes gain more knowledge of the
repercussions of the injury they may choose the sport they play wisely and use better technique
and try to protect themselves more while they are playing.

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Research
Today it is very hard to do the studies needed to see the full long term effects from
concussions. There have been many tests done to recognize if a concussion is actually present.
So far we only gather data on individuals to see how they might have had neurological issues
after they have already passed away and their brain is studied afterwards. What should be done to
help further understand the long term consequences is studying individuals that have suffered
several traumatic head injuries, and for those people to actually bring up the symptoms instead of
hiding them so they can continue to play sports, mostly professional athletes.
Many complications of traumatic brain injury are evident immediately or soon
after injury. Acute post-traumatic sensory, motor, and neurocognitive syndromes
are presumed to occur as a result of contusions and axonal disruption. Seemingly
mild closed-head injuries (i.e., those without skull fracture) may lead to diverse
and sometimes disabling symptoms, such as chronic headaches, dizziness and
vertigo, difficulty concentrating, word-finding problems, depression, irritability,
and impulsiveness. The duration of such symptoms varies but can be months.
Post-traumatic stress disorder frequently accompanies traumatic brain injury,
though the relationship is poorly understood. DeKosky, Ikonomovic, Gandy
Along with all these short term symptoms, long term symptoms are not short behind.
They have been doing studies among boxers to see the relation with traumatic brain injuries and
cognitive impairment. Boxers have been more prominent to receive more of these long term

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issues as they get older because they continue to take blows to the head. In the 1980s studies
were done, with retired boxers, by the number of rounds they actually competed in and not the
win-loss (which is the usual record to go by) to better predict the cognitive impairment they are
actually exposed to throughout their careers. One of the most interesting tests that were done was
they compared the number of rounds individuals were knocked out, and those that carried the
gene for late-onset Alzheimers were more likely to develop dementia than those who werent
carriers of the gene. Along with the individuals that develop dementia, Parkinsons is also
associated with dementia.
Since boxing is scored by knockouts, it is much easier to keep record of when the brain
injury occurred, but for wrestling and football it is much harder to keep record of when the
injuries occurred or when the symptoms even occurred or the degree of the injury.
Whereas in dementia pugilistic the numbers of rounds boxed or knockouts can be
roughly correlated with neuropathology, football players' concussion histories
have been poorly maintained, and no doseresponse relationship for traumatic
brain injury has been established in football or wrestling. One contributing factor
is that in football and wrestling cultures, injuries tend to be downplayed in order
to keep players in the game, whereas in boxing, knockouts are recorded as part of
scoring. - DeKosky, Ikonomovic, Gandy
Even though the cognitive decline doesnt begin until years after the athletes retire, having record
of when or how many head injuries they received would help in finding what actually caused the
start of all the cognitive issues. Now we know that dementia, Alzheimers, and Parkinsons are
all diseases that cannot be stopped but what they could do is at least have knowledge about them

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so maybe they can be postponed until further into retirement instead of shortly after they leave
the sport. Neuropsychological NFL testing programs are used to assess multiple aspects of
cognitive functioning. Although, the testing is really just a template because every head injury is
different and there is no definitive timetable for any concussion. In a report done in 2013, the
process of testing done before the season starts, in training camp, and the doctors assess the
functions such as memory, concentration, and balance. The doctors also evaluate the players
asking questions such as how many concussions they have experienced in their careers, how long
the recovery period was, and the players fill in a list of symptoms that they currently suffer from;
such as headaches, neck pain, fatigue, sensitivity to light, issues focusing, and others retaining to
post concussion symptoms.
After the players finish the questioning they move on to the comprehensive tests
assessing memory, reaction time, attention span, problem-solving, and others. On the field, there
is also an athletic trainer that sits up in the sky to keep an eye on the game and look for players
that seem to have symptoms of a concussion of the field. The players that are tested on the
sideline are asked to do the same tests that were required at the beginning of the season. The
athletes are first asked to do the same balance, memory, and concentration tests. The players are
also given a test to see how quickly and thoroughly they can recall words said to them no longer
than five minutes earlier, followed by game specific questions pertaining to the stadium they are
playing at, quarter of the game, who scored most recently, and who the previous team they
played was and if they won or lost that game. This series of questions usually takes about 12
minutes. After the athletes finish the questions that ends that part of the examination and
following would be the MRI/CT scans to get a look inside and see if there are any signs shown
on the brain.

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Conducting Study
When conducting research for individuals that have received concussions in contact
sports and understanding the long term outcomes, first you would need to get a group of
individuals that have received multiple concussions. What would be prefer to do in this
experiment, would b want to get a hand full of individuals from every sport where concussions
are more common and that most of the worrying comes from, such as football, hockey, boxing,
wrestling, and either soccer or rugby. What I would want to check through this research, is if
individuals that have received concussions or even multiple concussions/head trauma are more
common to receive mental illnesses or disabilities.
First, to conduct the experiment we would want to have individuals from each side of the
spectrum. For example, take a player from each sport that has suffered maybe one or two
concussions, one that has had multiple, and then last we would try to get one that has had no
head injuries at all (if possible). We would need complete documentation of when the injuries
occurred along with how long it took to fully recover or if they went back before they returned to
full health. Once we find out all their background information we would begin the study by
testing all of their basic motor skills, reaction time, balance, any regular cognitive skill to see if
they have had any permanent damage done to them from having head trauma.
Once all their testing we will continue the research with more testing such as EEG and
MRI so that we can see if there is any relationship between cognitive functioning and the past
head injuries. What they MRI will shows is if there are signs of Alzheimers and Parkinsons.
The EEG would show signs of how their mind works while they are sleeping. With this test we

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would be able to get an idea of how they sleep or rest and determine if there is any loss of sleep
or restlessness. In order to get a good idea of the actual long term effects of traumatic head
injuries these individuals would need to have their results documented and studied for many
years.
After all the results are collected the only thing we would really be able to do is
document how much worse the symptoms they are already experiencing get. If the symptoms get
worse or the individuals do show signs of having mental diseases medication would only be the
way to try and postpone the almost inevitable future, if they are more common to have mental
illnesses. All these results would show is the relation between concussions and the long term
effects of them. If this study goes well this information should be documented and spread, so that
all the individuals heading into a sport are more aware of what the consequence can be if they
have a long career, return from a concussion too soon, or refuse to document or report that they
have even suffered a concussion. With all this information getting out it should make the sports
safer, which is the ultimate goal of this research, making contact sports safer and educating
athletes.

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Conclusion
Throughout the research on the effect of receiving concussions or head injuries in sports
has shown how serious these injuries are. The short term effects must be treated and recovery
time should be taken with absolute care, and all head injuries should be reported and
documented. Also, these injuries should be observed if there are multiple because there can be
serious long term effects such as early development of Alzheimers or Parkinsons and early onset of dementia.
From the research done, it was concluded that all head injuries need to be taken seriously
and not a single concussion should be treated less than any other head injury/concussion. All
recoveries from head injuries should not be taken for granted because you must recover before
heading back to the sport. If an athlete returns to playing before they have taken the proper time
to recover, there can be serious long term consequences that are delayed until after their career
ends.
The conclusion drawn from this study was that documentation can change research
completely with this study. Also, we would get an idea if receiving concussions actually
influences brain functioning, concentration, thoughts, and effects sleep patterns. From gaining all
the studies from tests we should get an idea if individuals grow into these mental patterns or if
concussions actually speed up the process, we all know the myth but we would like to do as
many related tests as possible to get a general diagnosis not just a general idea. A
recommendation that is required for more exact studies would be to find out if athletes took any
performance enhancing drugs or steroids because those will change the readings of the tests, and
those drugs also have a tendency to influence mental illnesses.

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DeKosky, S., Ikonomovic, M., & Gandy, S. (2010). Traumatic Brain InjuryFootball, Warfare, and Long-Term Effects. The New England Journal of
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