Safe Football Research Paper

Statistics have shown that over 300,000, student athletes have sustained concussions per year. Concussions are the leading factor to student athletes getting CTE. CTE is a degenerative brain disease that involves a buildup of the abdominal protein (Tao). Studies have shown that 21% of high school players will contain CTE in their life (Haelle). Not only are concussions tackling athletes, but football is also causing serious bone injuries. Student athletes suffer an estimated 2 million injuries every year, which results in 500,000, doctor visits and 30,000 hospitalizations. Injuries go from broken figures all the way up to a broken neck or back. Studies have shown and will continue to show that football puts the greatest risk of injury on student athletes.

Football is one of the most beloved sports in the United States. It is one of the most violent bone crushing sports, leaving players permanently injured for life in some cases. The most common injury that football players suffer from pee-wee through the NFL is the concussion. A concussion is a traumatic brain injury that changes the way your brain works. The effects of a concussion are usually temporary and can result in a full recovery if its minor and treated correctly. A concussion can lead to brain problems later in life, even after a player has finished playing football. This is why people are studying and trying to understand concussions fully in order to prevent and treat future ones. Concussions are very

A reason why some people may believe that competitive sports causes concussions is that concussions do occur in sports. For instance, in the video “In Close- Concussion Concerns, Dr. Stan was asked about how many concussions happen in competitive sports in the United States. His answer was “3.8 to 4 million a year” (Concussions and Youth). This shows that concussions actually do occur in competitive sports. When athletes play in sports, they do have a chance of getting concussions. Even though concussions occur in competitive sports, that does not mean that competitive sports are bad for kids. In reality sports have many safety precautions to prevent injuries such as concussions. Furthermore, in the article “Hard Knocks”, the author Laura Modigliani asserts that in football hits to the head are illegal in the NFL. Players also cannot run into each other during drills (Modigliani 1). This proves that in reality sports help prevent concussions. In football, one of the most dangerous sports for concussions, hits to the head are illegal, and players cannot run into each other during drills. This shows that sports such as football stop concussions from happening. Some people believe that concussions can just happen in competitive sports and that there are no safety precautions for it. However, competitive sports are good for

CTE is a brain disease found in individuals with annals of head trauma. It has specifically been found in athletes with numerous concussions. So far it can only be diagnosed in the deceased, but Dr. Julian Bales and his staff in UCLA have discovered symptoms in living players such as Hall of Famer Anthony “Tony” Dorsett, Hall of Famer Joe DeLamielleure, and NFL All-Pro Leonard Marshall. CTE can cause memory loss, dementia, depression, suicidal thoughts, cognitive and emotional difficulties (Waldron par 1, 2, 3). Is it a compelling issue? A total of 171 concussions were reported in the NFL in the 2012-2013 season; 88 thus far in the 2013-2014 season (Frontline pt). Those are just numbers in the professional level. There are thousands of kids playing football either in youth, middle school, high school, or college level. The diagnosis is currently in progress, researchers are optimistic this could lead to a legitimate treatment, how to manage, and hopefully a cure. Furthermore, this can also possibly lead to an answer to a connection between football and chronic traumatic encephalopathy. Junior Seau, Mike Webster, Terry Long, and Justin Strzelczyk (all of whom are dead now) are all men who played in the NFL for an extent period of time. This is not the only thing they have in common. These former players had an uncustomary

I think a bigger change that we could make is having players learn to tackle at practice without helmets on. There was a study done by the University of New Hampshire football team and The National Athletic Trainers Research and Education Foundation where they tested the impact of players practicing with helmets and some without. The goal of this study was to see if helmetless practice would teach players to not tackle using their heads which currently is a main reason why players get concussions. They had the control group practice with helmets on, while the intervention group did not wear shoulder pads or helmets. They completed a five minute drill and the purpose of not wear pads or helmets was supposed to teach the players to learn to tackle without using their heads in a way that they could be injured. They found substantial evidence that this helped prevent head injuries, it resulted in a 28% reduction in head injuries over the course of the football season for

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).

According to research published by Boston University 87 out of 91 former NFL players tested positive for CTE or Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy those 87 had suffered at least 3 concussions during their career.

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

In 2012, the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) referred to this concussion crisis as an epidemic. As previous stated, repeated head trauma, such as suffering multiple concussions, is thought to be one of the main predisposing risk factors for developing CTE. Although it is unlikely that one concussion will develop into CTE, research is still be conducted on the amount and severity of a concussion that is required for a player to develop CTE. In published data that looked at the correlation between concussions and CTE, it was found that 84 % of participants with CTE had suffered at least one concussion in his lifetime. Majority of these players suffered more than 15 reported concussions during their lifetime and had over 15 years experience playing football. This evidence is sufficient enough to suggest that concussions are a contributing factor to developing CTE (Stein, Alvarez, & McKee,

Did you know that 99% of the dead NFL players had signs of Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) when scientist looked through their brain (Ventras)? Most people wouldn’t know this fact, but scientist do and have known this since 2002. Even though they are making improvements, there is still an alarming rate of concussions happening. This report will discuss who is affected, how it can be prevented, how it is affecting sports today.

Facts from the article “CITE” examines how the NFL dealt with the issues of concussions over the years. Beginning with Omalu’s discovery of CTE, the NFL strongly resisted to admitting that multiple head injuries leads to impair cognitive functions. The NFL committee was composed of internal NFL doctors who denied scientific studies claiming of the lack of scientific evidence and causation between repeated head injuries and brain damage. The Congressional Hearing in 2009 criticized NFL’s concussion policy and demanded the committee to take

Science says concussions are inevitable; 96 percent of all NFL players and 79 percent of all football players test positive for brain disease (Source: Frontline League of Denial 9/18/15 Concussion Watch Article). Prior to 2002, the NFL’s approach to preventing, treating, and managing concussions and CTE was very different than it is today. My essay will explore what some of those differences were and whether or not changes in the NFL are improving the outcomes and quality of life for current and former NFL players.

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.

A recent study of college football players has shown that those who participate in high contact sports and have had a concussion before have a 300% higher chance of having another one in comparison to athletes that have never had a concussion before (Jolicoeur et al, 2007). The NFL and NCAA have enacted several rule changes in order to minimize the occurrence of concussions. These new rules, like many before them, have come under the scrutiny of the very athletes that they were meant to protect. The NHL and NHL Players Association in 1997 together created a program in order to get a better understanding of concussions and how to prevent them (Burke et al, 2011). According to Covassin (2008), athletes who have had more than one concussion take a longer time to recover with each concussion that they suffer from.

From the years 1990 to 2007 the percentage of sprains, strains, broken bones, and dislocations increased by 27 percent, and broken bones, dislocations, and concussions made up 1/3 of the emergency room visits from children ages 6 to 17 years old (Elango) ( “Long Term Damage” ). The season players of the NFL received 32 percent more head injuries in 2015 than they did in the prior year. Doctors also widely believe that football players who receive multiple head blows have an increased chance to get chronic traumatic encephalopathy, CTE. CTE can cause many problems such as impaired judgment, problems controlling impulses, and dementia ( “Farewell to Football”). After Omalu was the first doctor to realize that football can cause head injuries and brain damage other doctors also started to determine he was correct. After various doctors agreed on this the NFL started to provide 5 million dollars to retired players who have a serious medical condition related to head trauma starting April of 2015 (Dodd, et