More handpicked essays just for you.
Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (cte
What can be done to prevent concussions in football
Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (cte
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Concussion Prevention
How would you like to have severe, irreversible brain damage in your early to late twenties? This has been happening to football players in the NFL for the past 50 years. Concussions are killing thousands of people per year. The controversy concerning safety in American football has been going on for years. In 2013, former NFL athletes sued the NFL for past concussions. Football related concussions could be prevented with proper education and technique, reliable and efficient equipment, better football rules and regulations, and influence on young football players. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) has developed a tool kit for high school coaches containing information on concussions and what people can do to prevent
…show more content…
“While conducting an autopsy on football player Mike Webster, forensic pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu discovers something particularly interesting about his death” (Vrentas). There is neurological deterioration that is similar to Alzheimer’s disease but not the same” (Vrentas). Omalu discovers that the football players that have gotten so many blows to the brain have suffered some brain damage that could make them go insane and result in suicide in years to come. “As many other athletes face the same diagnosis, the doctor embarks on a mission to raise public awareness about the dangers of football related head trauma to save the lives of these football players” (Vrentas). Dr. Bennet Omalu discovers that these football players were getting Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. This is a progressive degenerative disease found in people who have suffered resistive brain trauma. “Researchers from the Department of Veterans Affairs and Boston University publicized that they had identified CTE in 96 percent of NFL players that they had examined” (Vrentas). Later, the National Football League was sued and Dr. Bennet Omalu had published his findings. Many people in the movie “Concussion” disagree with the fact that the National Football League is being sued. The National Football League hides evidence that these concussions are causing critical brain injuries and horrific symptoms that will affect these former football players. Many people think that the symptoms are not caused by concussions and playing pro football. Little do they know that the National Football League is not revealing how many times these football players get hit each season. With this being said, the symptoms that are occurring in these football players are caused by playing professional
A big part of the NFL’s hold on players is their contracts and money. Thousands of young men aspire to be on a professional team, just for the fame, money and title. They are not made aware of the lasting conditions that come with playing football and their everlasting effects. If anything, the NFL has gone out of their way to discredit the newer research that links playing football with CTE. CTE stands for chronic traumatic encephalopathy, which is a disease that has the same effects as dementia and Alzheimer’s, except that CTE leaves tau protein deposition in distinctive areas of the brain, which is what separates CTE from dementia and Alzheimer’s....
CTE is a progressive neurodegenerative disease which has not been found in football players until recently. It was stated in the episode, “Repetitive brain trauma starts this cascade of events in the brain that changes the way tau [protein] looks and behaves. It goes awry, it starts destroying the integrity of the brain cells.” Doctor Omalu’s discovery was the first hard evidence which proved playing football could cause permanent damage. This finding was not well received by the NFL and Omalu was met with attacks by the MTBI committee and the NFL as a whole.
The average NFL player takes up to 1,000 blows to the head throughout their football career. Some of those blows can have the force of a sledgehammer (“RealNatural”). Based on a research study by Dr. Jesse David, there were 265 concussions reported in the 2012 season, during the 2011 season there were 266 concussions, and 270 concussions in 2010 season (Kacsmar). It has been known that repeated blows to the head can cause long-term brain damage since at least the 1950’s, long before most of the NFL players had begun their careers (“RealNatural”). Past infractions of the NFL have already resulted in over 4,500 forme...
Johnson, L. M. (2012). Return to Play Guidelines Cannot Solve the Football-Related Concussion Problem. Journal of School Health, 82(4), 180-185.
Corwin, Tom. “Football clinic aims to help parents, players prevent concussions.” Augusta Chronicle, The (GA) 25 February 2014: Newspaper Source. Web. 4 April 2014
“Football’s Endgame: What would happen if America’s Pastime just...died” is the title that had heads turning when it made its way onto Sports Illustrated. Football is the United State’s favorite sport so an article like this one was sure to shock fans. The article was written to be set ten years from now when the game of football met its death. Giving the ongoing issues surrounding the game in 2016, the author Austin Murphy dated the article September 7,2036. In this article Murphy talks about the factors that led to the end of one of the U.S’s beloved sports. Factors like the AIG not protecting athletes against head injuries in the NFL, Pop Warner settling a death with the family of a former football player who committed suicide at the age of 25 from CTE caused by hits to the head, and the 10% rise in football concussions. A woman whose son had passed away from a motorcycle accident noticed changes in her boy. Playing football for almost a decade he was bound to get hurt, but it was after his death that doctors found he had CTE. CTE is a topic of discussion in this article. Sports Illustrated works to inform everyone about CTE and its effects on the mind. This disease targets the way a person thinks and changes their moods, “He had all these [football-related] problems with his knees and back, but his brain was
Athletes are one of the most highly paid professions, and with that comes a great responsibility to everyone but themselves, even it means putting their lives, and others around them at risk. A football player’s goal is to entertain the fans that tune in to watch them, however their only job is to win their games, and untimely a Super Bowl Championship, but not for themselves, for the franchise that owns them and their bodies. As long as they can run a play and take a hit foot players are gold to their employers, or if you will their owners. “Toughing it out, turns out, can kill people.” (Diaz Truman, M 2013), and cause irreversible brain damage to football players. Continuing to ignore evidence that supports the growing concern of traumatic brain injury (TBI) and how it relates to the NFL players is troubling because of the long term affects it has on a player’s mental s...
The number of concussions in professional and amateur football has been rising and has sparked much controversy in recent years. These concussions are most likely linked with disease and even the deaths of some pro and semi-pro football players. New research is attempting to solve the problem but the issue is still prevalent in football today.
From the year 2001 to 1005 children aged 5-18 accounted for 2.4 million emergency room visits due to sports related injuries. Of these visits around 6 percent involved a concussion(The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). Every athlete that receives a concussion does not necessarily go to the emergency room. Athletic trainers, when available and certified, can oversee the recovery of an athlete without a trip to the emergency room. Some concussions go untreated altogether. While the percentage may seem low, looki...
Football is America’s favorite sport. It is a fast-paced, hard-hitting game. Every week thousands of men and boys all across the country take part in football and every week these men and boys receive violent hits during the game. Frequently, as a result of these violent hits, the player receives a concussion. However, the long-term effects of concussions on players are not fully understood. New research shows that even a slight concussion in a football game can have lasting effects on a player. As a result of this research, children under the age of fourteen should not play tackle football.
Concussions can spring from practically anywhere; at home during cleaning, playing catch in the yard, or even slipping and falling. One of the most common reasons concussions happen is from sports, most often from football. It should be common knowledge on the symptoms of a concussion and what to do to help it heal, especially coaches. Because of the mindset that coaches give towards their players and the spirit of the game, athletes do not report their injuries to their coaches. One reports states, “The culture of sports negatively influences athletes’ self-reporting of concussion symptoms and their adherence to return-to-play guidance” (Waldron). This means that athletes could have any injury, not just a concussion, and they would be afraid to tell the coach because they are afraid of getting taken out of the game. More coaches, however, are starting to come around to educating the team and support staff about head injuries. Some coaches are actually sitting their teams down and making them watch a video on what happens during a concussion. In one report, the athletes said that after they watched the video, “they would be su...
Scientific American 306.2 (2012): 66-71. Print. The. Brady, Erik. “Changing the Game on Youth Concussions.”
Through sports or through everyday life, concussions tend to happen. An estimated 300 000 sport-related traumatic brain injuries, predominantly concussions, occur annually in the United States. Sports are second only to motor vehicle crashes as the leading cause of traumatic brain injury among people aged 15 to 24 years. (U.S National Library of Medicine). Coaches and parents often do not go through the right procedures or protocols when dealing with a teenager who has received a blow to the head. The usual questions that are asked when there is a head injury are, “what day is it, what’s the score, and how many fingers am I holding up?” Now these are not poor questions, but these questions alone cannot determine if a person has suffered a concussion. The correct method, which they are now implementing in most professional sports leagues, is for anyone with a head injury to take a legitimate concussion test performed by the team doctor. (WebbMD) At present the symptoms can be hit or miss. After receiving a concussion, research shows that an “estimated 80 to 90% of concussions heal spontaneously in the first 7 to 10 days”. (Barton Straus) But, it is important to remember not to return until all symptoms are
In August of 2013, the National Football League announced they were paying $765 million to settle a lawsuit involving thousands of its former players over problems related to head trauma (Richardson). This is just one sign of the growing concern that the sport’s collisions pose a serious risk to long-term player health. There is little known about how a full season of head hits affects the largest group of football athletes: the nearly four million youth and high school student players.
Many memories are made in football, but sadly some of the greatest players cannot recall them. The National Football League has been associated with concussions and brain traumas throughout the years, but lately it has been exposed by media and NFL veterans. The league recently “reached a $765 million preliminary settlement with thousands of former players who were suing the league over its treatment of concussions…” (Waldron). Many former players are experiencing the effects of taking hard hits over and over again; they were not properly treated, which makes the injury worse and long term. The concussion issue in the NFL is more prevalent today, because it affects not only the players, but the league as a whole.