If you are a fan of the NFL, then you have probably noticed a change in the game recently. New rules have been rolling out and all these rules seem to have one goal, to lessen the severity of impacts. But why is the NFL trying to make hard hitting tackles less severe? The answer may lie in new discoveries about concussions, and those discoveries could affect your student athlete too.
How Dangerous Are Concussions?
More and more studies are finding athletes with CTE—chronic traumatic encephalopathy. This condition is marked by the buildup of proteins that eventually cause cell death in brain tissue. It has been blamed for depression, suicidal behavior, as well as violent behavior in athletes, and medical professionals agree that it’s caused by multiple concussions and other sports-related head injuries. This has led to several lawsuits against the NFL since players suffered injuries that may have led to this condition while playing for these organizations. So the league is taking action, but it won’t be an easy undertaking.
Analyzing this condition has been difficult for medical researchers. Diagnosing CTE is limited to postmortem analysis, which means that doctors are only able to find the condition after a person has died. That also means that athletes must donate their brains to be studied before they die and that’s causing an even bigger concern.
There are a high number of CTE findings in athletes, yet the majority of athletes are never tested for CTE after they pass. This could mean that more athletes suffer from CTE than we could have dreamed, and that has the NFL worried.
Are Concussions to Student Athletes More Dangerous than We Realize?
New rules to prevent concussions and to immediately treat athletes that suffer a concussion have taken effect in the NFL. However, these efforts have not just extended to professional sports. Professional sports organizations are trying to get youth coaches to change the way they teach football. These experts have noticed the lower concussion rates in contact sports like rugby, and they want to teach football players those safer tackling methods.
If young players are taught these safer ways to play football, then they will take these methods with them into college and professional sports. Do you think this will be the way to make football safer for a new generation of athletes? Are there other things these organizations can do to ensure the health of their players? Tell the traumatic brain injury attorneys here at Colson Hicks Eidson what you think. Head over to out Facebook and Twitter page and let your voices be heard.
