Concussions Case Study

Children’s brains are not as well built as the brains of adults. A child is more assailable than adults to concussions, Robert Cantu, a concussion expert says,”They don’t have fully myelinated brains, so the nerve cells and their connections don’t have the coating and insulation of adult brains. In addition, they have disproportionately weak necks compared to adults, and disproportionately large, heavy heads, so they’re like bobble-head dolls. This sets them up for brain injuries that are more serious than those sustained at a later age from the same amount of force.” (Usatoday. "Parents' Vigilance Can Head off Kids' Concussion Risk." USA Today. Gannett). With the account of helmets having the inability to prevent mild traumatic brain injuries,

A concussion is a brief unconsciousness caused by a blow to the head. In conformity with the Neurology Journal, every child ages nine to twelve can be exposed to 240 impacts during a single football season. A case study conducted by Kontos AP, Elbin RJ, Fazio-Sumrock VC, Burkhart S., Swindell H, Maroon J, and Collins MW, determined the risk of concussion among youth football players, ages eight to twelve. 468 male youth football players in western Pennsylvania participated in this study. A total of 11,338, 8,415 practices, and 2,923 games took place, and athletic exposures in the study period, which is where twenty medically diagnosed concussions followed. Forty-five percent of the concussions were from head-to-head contact. The combined concussion IR, incidence rate, for practices and games was 1.76 per 1000 AEs, athletic exposures.The IDR, incidence density ratio, of concussions for youth aged eleven to twelve years compared with youth aged eight to ten years was 2.72. Conclusively, participation in the games was correlated with an optimization in risk of concussion compared with practices, which was greater than rates already reported for high school and collegiate athletes. A child/adolescent football player has a higher risk of getting a concussion than a high school or college football

Various head trauma incidents add to the advancement of mild cognitive impairments, post-concussion syndrome, and chronic traumatic encephalopathy. The Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease defines mild cognitive impairment, also known as MCI, as a condition that generally anticipates Alzheimer’s disease, also memory loss and inability to do convoluted activities, like financial planning. The Mayo Clinic characterizes post-concussion syndrome, also known as PCS, as a disorder with many symptoms, such as headaches and dizziness, that progresses for weeks or months after the injury that caused the concussion. Symptoms appear the start of seven to ten days and go away in a period of three months, and can persist for more than a year. Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, also known as CTE, is the most commonly worried and talked about in the football league. Boston University’s CTE Center describes it as a continuing, retrogressive disease of the brain, especially found in athletes with past constant brain trauma, including symptomatic concussions as well as subconcussive hits that do not show any signs of symptoms to the head. This triggers progressive degeneration of the brain tissue. These changes in the brain can begin months, years, or decades after the last brain trauma or end of the athlete’s active involvement. The