ALS Essay

Hello everyone. I am aware that many of you in this room participate in collegiate sports and many of these facts that I will inform you one you may not like to hear but I feel that it is important for people to know. According to NCAA.org, 10,500 brain injuries have occurred, 3,400 of which have been from football alone. In addition to this, 30% of these have been in females. Brain injuries are extremely hard on the body and can result in life long damage or even death, and it is very important for the student athletes to be aware of these risks and what they can do to prevent them.

B. Walking becomes difficult, if a fall occurs, the person may not be able to stand back up alone. Driving is relinquished. Weakness in swallowing muscle may cause choking, and greater difficulty eating and managing saliva.

CTE affects many different athletes all over the world. Chronic Traumatic encephalopathy or normally referred to as CTE is a brain disease that affects people who have had multiple head injuries. It is found in many cases of ex NFL players who took many hits to the head when playing over their careers. There are many documented cases of it across other sports and some military veterans as well. We have made large strides in learning more and more about the terrible disease. The game of football has changed since we have learned so much more about the terrible disease in recent years. We could prevent concussions by changing the way players practice.

Have you ever heard of ALS, better known as Lou Gehrig’s disease? For many people, ALS is a disorder that they may not know much about. I never heard of it either until my father was diagnosed with this disease in 2006. Because there is no known cure, it is important to detect this disease early, so that proper treatments and preparation can be done before it’s too late.

While the NFL is putting new rules and regulations on equipment and which type of tackles are allowed, living retired NFL players are found to already have symptoms of CTE (Fainaru, 2013). Through brain scans and research done by UCLA, they have identified proteins in player’s brains that cause CTE, which as Dr. Julian Bailes, co-director or North Shore Neurological Institute said, is the “holy grail” to studying CTE and finding ways to cure and prevent it (Fainaru, 2013). While this is a break through, there is still no cure or way to treat CTE (Fainaru, 2013). But this research also raises questions about CTE and the NFL. Will players be required to be tested for CTE? Can players be denied playing anymore if CTE is found? Will this greatly affect the way that football is currently played? As the research is still being collected, there is still no definite answer to any of those questions, but the NFL has acknowledged the correlations of CTE and concussions caused by playing in the NFL and assures that they will do all they can to help prevent severe brain trauma to their players, including donating $30 million to the National Institutes of Health to conduct further research on CTE (Kroll, 2013).

The first step to reducing the danger of CTE, is putting more time and money into CTE research. One of the most challenging circumstances dealing with CTE research is that so far researchers have only been able to confirm CTE through post-mortem brain examinations. While people may exhibit signs of CTE such as anger, depression and memory loss, it is impossible to know whether the player is afflicted by CTE or another disease without destroying the brain. To further understand CTE researchers must be able to develop a way to accurately detect CTE in living patients, and properly treat them accordingly. The second, and most common form of reducing CTE risk, lies in producing newer and better equipment. In an article by NeurologyAdvisor, they have decided that, “Most of the public believe that equipment, including new and improved helmets, mouthpieces, sensors, and more have the most potential for improving safety” (Williams). A topic that is currently being discussed, but has little backing, is a new mouthpiece that will be able to record the force of the hit that players receive. This mouthpiece will be connected to a computer that trainers and medical officials on the sidelines can monitor and be alerted when it is possible that a player may have a concussion or other head injuries. While this is a

A CTE, or Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, is a, “progressive degenerative disease that is believed to plague people who've suffered severe or repeated blows to the head” (Murphy). A player can have a CTE and not even know that they are suffering from it. This is because CTEs can only be discovered after the person dies. Paul Bright, for example, was a football player who played from the time that he was seven until he was a freshman in high school. He had experienced only one concussion, but it changed his entire life. His family and friends described him as hard working and upbeat, but then, something changed. He became reckless and erratic; these traits caused him to die at age twenty-four from a motorcycle wreck. His mother sent his brain off to be tested and discovered that he had been suffering from Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy. This brain disease had caused him to make the type of impulsive decisions that took his life (Murphy). In addition to the CTEs players may experience, the likelihood of dying from brain and nervous system issues increases significantly for football players. Studies from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health discovered that, “death involving neurodegenerative causes among the retired players was three times higher than in the general U.S. population, and the risk for two major

Within the last few years, the BU ADC developed a new branch called the Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy Center (CTE Center), which is devoted specifically to research this disease (Boston University, n.d.). In 2015, a team of scientists from the CTE Center conducted a study analyzing the brain tissue of deceased football players. The researchers separated the participants into two groups: (a) those who played professional football, and (b) those who had played football during some part of their lifetime (high school level, college level, etc.). The results showed that 87 of the 91 NFL players tested positive for CTE. In addition, 131 of the 195 subjects who had played football during some part of their lifetime tested positive for CTE (Breslow, 2015). This study proved that CTE could affect any athlete (including high school level athletes), not just professional

Since the 1920s, there has been a severe disease linked to athletes. Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) is a disease that effects athletes that have had head trauma. The trauma causes the brain tissue to deteriorate. The changes can become apparent after months, years, or even decades. CTE is linked to memory loss, confusion, impaired judgment, impulse control problems, aggression, depression, and, eventually, progressive dementia. (“What”, 2009). CTE has caused football to change as well as the equipment. CTE is now widely known and is effecting, not only professional athletes, but also high school athletes. Concussions and chronic traumatic encephalopathy are serious conditions that can affect anyone and have adverse effects.

Signs such as memory disturbances, behavioral and personality changes, parkinsonism, language, and gait abnormalities are just some of the few consequences people have to live with who are affected with CTE.1,5 The condition is characteristic of atrophy associated with medial and temporal lobes, ventricle dilation, and widespread tau-immunoreactive pathology. Evidence all points that repetitive traumatic brain injuries lead to CTE before any clinical manifestations arise.1 By instituting proper head protection, as well as safer return to play guidelines after head injury, CTE can be dramatically reduced in athletes all around the world. In more drastic approaches, certain high impact sports can be eliminated as a whole in order to greatly reduce CTE in athletes. There is no cure, no treatment options, and no tests available yet to diagnosis this disease. Experts urge that the best preventative to CTE is to avoid all contact sports in altogether, something that millions fail to

This paper connects contact sports with degenerative brain diseases. It also shows that CTE is not only connected to football because of the continuous tackling inducing trauma to the brain, but also soccer where heading the ball can often cause brain damage. This is supported by research of retired NFL football players and soccer players whose brains showed evidence of CTE. Also when the Mayo Clinic studying the brains of those who did not participate in contact sports showing no evidence of CTE. Based on scientific evidence degenerative brain diseases such as CTE are caused by successive concussions. Since concussions are one of the most common brain injuries seen in contact sports today there is a definite association between contact sports and degenerative brain diseases.

Imagine having to attend to a loved one because of their horrific state of health after a colossal impact they sustained. This unfortunately is the reality for many worldwide. Athletes are experiencing many internal injuries such as Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) and Concussions. Although the majority of people understand the risks of participating in sports, they fail to realize just how common athletes are diagnosed with these fatal diseases. The safety of athletes is now being put to question.

In the Newsela article, "Brain disease called CTE is found to affect almost all pro football players," the main event is explained how the majority of football players, no matter the type of league, have CTE (chronic traumatic encephalopathy). CTE is a disease, commonly found in athletes, where the brain slowly degenerates over time, and has symptoms of memory loss, anxiety, confusion, impaired judgment, impulsive control problems, suicidal tendencies, Parksinson's disease, and, eventually, dementia. In the article, CTE is commonly found in football players who have with stood injuries, such as concussions, during their football careers: before high school, during high school, semi-professional, Canadian Football League, and the NFL (National

There is a dark cloud hanging over the world of contact sports and it is growing at an alarming rate. With the size and speed of today’s athletes, the sports of football and hockey have become more exciting, fast paced, wide open, and fun to watch. However, there is another consequence of these ever growing athletes on their sports. They have made the collisions in them increasingly more violent. The velocity that these athletes hurl themselves through the air has created an atmosphere that could not have been imagined when these sports were created. Although the athletes’ bodies have become

P: After working together and people looking out for each other the team will get stronger and be more productive as there is high morale