Watching college football today and lo and behold, a “football mom” speaking for the game in an ad. I guess the backlash to the continued reports of permanent damage from concussions is going to begin.
I remain bewildered that there is still football in schools (colleges, meh, that is an adult choice and a whole subject that is outside of education IMO). They build new high schools here all the time and WTH are they doing investing such $$ in the fields and seating and facilities? How is this choice insurable in the age of enlightenment?
The science has a long way to go. There’s no proven way to measure CTE outside of an autopsy. There’s been some techniques proposed, but their diagnostic validity hasn’t been proven yet. Autopsies, at least in the studies I’m familiar with, aren’t random samples, but donated by families who observed CTE symptoms. The selection bias renders such “studies” almost worthless. Then, the difference in size and speed of players is such that any studies on the NFL may not be applicable to high school/middle school students.
Mr R and I have already decided that we won’t let our kids play football unless something drastically changes. It’s just not worth the risk.
I grew up with a dad who got a TBI when I was in middle school. I know what brain injuries do to people. I know what they do to families.
(Yes I know there are risks in all sports, but football has an unnecessarily high risk.)
Agree, romani. So many other options for young, budding athletes.
Yeah, and no one was sure cigarettes were bad for you either…
Well I’ve always had FAD (football attention deficit) so I was never going to be a football fan. Now that I know that football is a concussion generating activity I am happy to have FAD.
It’s interesting that in our extended family, the only family where BOTH of the sons played football was the one where both parents are physicians. Our kids decided when they were 5 and 6 years old they wouldn’t do soccer headers because they didn’t want to risk losing brain cells. My relatives whose boys played football both suffered some injuries.
Alzheimer’s cannot be officially diagnosed until autopsy, but radiological studies and neuropsychological test patterns can present a pretty compelling case. That’s not to say that there aren’t other dementias that present with a similar constellation of symptoms, but plenty can be recognized before autopsy.
^Doctors do routinely diagnose Alzheimer’s and those diagnosis are used for official purposes, such as what treatment insurance pays for. There’s no definitive test for Alzheimer’s vs other forms of dementia, but there is a far greater consensus on how to diagnose Alzheimer’s vs CTE. Then, all longitudinal studies of dementia have the problem if you want to know whether something that happened at 20 causes dementia at 60, you need to run your study for 40 years.
That goes without say, but over the past decades, improvements have been made in identifying the clinical and radiological patterns of these disease processes. But lets not hijack this thread discussing the diagnostic criteria and clinical presentations, mri/pet/spect scan patterns in varying dementia processes.
@roethlisburger and @jym626 Sadly, a new study has revealed that even when the head trauma occurs in childhood, CTE is found. Study was not biased by “preselction” and there was a control group. My sister suffered from a concussion from a fall 3 years ago. She has been fortunate to find specialists (neuro opthomologist, messgae specialists, PT) that have helped her recover from the trauma but it is a long process. She almost had to quit working as the vertigo was hard to shake. You wouldn’t wish this on anyone.
@mysmom, my D has a friend going through a similar experience with a severe concussion. It’s so sad and she has few safety nets it’s equally hard. And finding the right physician has been difficult
@deb922 It took some time before my sister found an amazing neuro opthomologist. She was a miracle worker. I will be happy to share the contact information with you. Definitely worth pursuing. PM me if you’re interested. All the best to your daughter’s friend.
This is not limited to football - just had a conversation a few days ago with a young lady who played field hockey in college. Says she can never step foot on the field again as a player (she is coaching) because of her 6 concussions from playing in college.
That was the one good thing about my sons getting diagnosed with a mild bleeding disorder - no football or hockey allowed! My younger son had the build for both sports, so I’m thankful he wasn’t allowed to play.
From the author of the Wake Forest study:
https://press.rsna.org/timssnet/media/pressreleases/14_pr_target.cfm?ID=1905
If you’re going to bring up a study, you should link to it or at least specify who the author is.
When this topic comes up, I always think about Brett Favre. He has stated publicly that he has memory loss that he thinks was caused by being sacked so often: http://www.kansascity.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/vahe-gregorian/article1269677.html
I have FAD too! That’s so funny! Never heard of it phrased that way before. I’m stealing that.
@roethlisburger My apologies. The study linked later health poblems to playing tackle football.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/2017/09/19/study-links-youth-football-greater-risk-later-health-problems/UF3vWIAraotnJnbU8o8TDP/story.html. I had originally heard about it on a public radio program that referenced both the original CTE findings on the NFL players and this more recent study. The lead author is Michael Alosco and the study was done at Boston University Medical School’s Chonic Traumatic Encephalopathy Center.