Concussion Inc

Inside the most controversial issue in sports Traumatic brain injury in football is not incidental, but an inevitable and central aspect of the sport. Starting in high school, through college, and into the NFL, young players face repeated head trauma, and those sustained injuries create lifelong cognitive and functional difficulties. Muchnick's Concussion Inc. blog exposed the decades-long cover-up of scientific research into sports concussions and the ongoing denial to radically reform football in North America. This compilation from Muchnick's no-holds-barred investigative website reveals the complete head injury story as it developed, from the doctor who played fast and loose with the facts about the efficacy of the state-mandated concussion management system for high school football players, to highly touted solutions that are more self-serving cottage industry than of any genuine benefit. Known for extensive reporting on the tragic story of the Chris Benoit murder-suicide, Muchnick turns his investigative analysis to traumatic brain injury and probes deep into the corporate, government, and media corruption that has enabled the $10-billion-a-year National Football League to trigger a public health crisis.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE • Dr. Bennet Omalu discovered something he could not ignore. The NFL tried to silence him. His courage would change everything. “A gripping medical mystery and a dazzling portrait of the young scientist no one wanted to listen to . . . a fabulous, essential read.”—Rebecca Skloot, author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Jeanne Marie Laskas first met the young forensic pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu in 2009, while reporting a story for GQ that would go on to inspire the movie Concussion. Omalu told her about a day in September 2002, when, in a dingy morgue in downtown Pittsburgh, he picked up a scalpel and made a discovery that would rattle America in ways he’d never intended. Omalu was new to America, chasing the dream, a deeply spiritual man escaping the wounds of civil war in Nigeria. The body on the slab in front of him belonged to a fifty-year-old named Mike Webster, aka “Iron Mike,” a Hall of Fame center for the Pittsburgh Steelers, one of the greatest ever to play the game. After retiring in 1990, Webster had suffered a dizzyingly steep decline. Toward the end of his life, he was living out of his van, tasering himself to relieve his chronic pain, and fixing his rotting teeth with Super Glue. How did this happen?, Omalu asked himself. How did a young man like Mike Webster end up like this? The search for answers would change Omalu’s life forever and put him in the crosshairs of one of the most powerful corporations in America: the National Football League. What Omalu discovered in Webster’s brain—proof that Iron Mike’s mental deterioration was no accident but a disease caused by blows to the head that could affect everyone playing the game—was the one truth the NFL wanted to ignore. Taut, gripping, and gorgeously told, Concussion is the stirring story of one unlikely man’s decision to stand up to a multibillion-dollar colossus, and to tell the world the truth.

In the past decade, few subjects at the intersection of medicine and sports have generated as much public interest as sports-related concussions - especially among youth. Despite growing awareness of sports-related concussions and campaigns to educate athletes, coaches, physicians, and parents of young athletes about concussion recognition and management, confusion and controversy persist in many areas. Currently, diagnosis is based primarily on the symptoms reported by the individual rather than on objective diagnostic markers, and there is little empirical evidence for the optimal degree and duration of physical rest needed to promote recovery or the best timing and approach for returning to full physical activity. Sports-Related Concussions in Youth: Improving the Science, Changing the Culture reviews the science of sports-related concussions in youth from elementary school through young adulthood, as well as in military personnel and their dependents. This report recommends actions that can be taken by a range of audiences - including research funding agencies, legislatures, state and school superintendents and athletic directors, military organizations, and equipment manufacturers, as well as youth who participate in sports and their parents - to improve what is known about concussions and to reduce their occurrence. Sports-Related Concussions in Youth finds that while some studies provide useful information, much remains unknown about the extent of concussions in youth; how to diagnose, manage, and prevent concussions; and the short- and long-term consequences of concussions as well as repetitive head impacts that do not result in concussion symptoms. The culture of sports negatively influences athletes' self-reporting of concussion symptoms and their adherence to return-to-play guidance. Athletes, their teammates, and, in some cases, coaches and parents may not fully appreciate the health threats posed by concussions. Similarly, military recruits are immersed in a culture that includes devotion to duty and service before self, and the critical nature of concussions may often go unheeded. According to Sports-Related Concussions in Youth, if the youth sports community can adopt the belief that concussions are serious injuries and emphasize care for players with concussions until they are fully recovered, then the culture in which these athletes perform and compete will become much safer. Improving understanding of the extent, causes, effects, and prevention of sports-related concussions is vitally important for the health and well-being of youth athletes. The findings and recommendations in this report set a direction for research to reach this goal.

Eric E. Hall, PhD has expertise in the area of exercise psychology focusing on how physical activity affects mental health (e.g., affect and cognition) and the underlying neuroscientific mechanisms. Dr. Hall has been forming collaborations around concussion work since 2009 and has been co-principal investigator on two grants from American Medical Society for Sports Medicine. He has served on the NCAA Committee on Competitive Safeguards and Medical Aspects of Sports and is currently on the NCAA Concussion Protocol Committee. He is also on the editorial board for the journals: Psychology of Sport and Exercise as well as Sports. His excellence in research and mentorship has been recognized at Elon. Caroline J. Ketcham, PhD has expertise in the area of motor control and focuses on how movements are controlled, organized and coordinated. Her work includes assessing movement and developing therapeutic interventions for neurodiverse populations to improve coordination and integration. Caroline''s expertise in balance assessment and sensorimotor integration were incorporated into Elon''s concussion work 4 years ago and she has continued to lead on investigations between neurocognitive and motor function in brain injury and recovery. Together Drs. Hall and Ketcham established and Co-Direct Elon BrainCARE Research Institute with a mission to 1) help create a supportive environment for students and student-athletes to become educated concerning the potential impact of concussions through evidence based practices and research; and 2) to create health promoting environments that support resilience and positive mental wellness. Since 2012, Elon BrainCARE has resulted in over 40 presentations at regional, national and international conferences, published over 10 papers and mentored or co-mentored over 25 undergraduate students engaged in Elon BrainCARE research. In addition, Hall and Ketcham have organized and hosted annual symposia for 4 years inviting the Elon and surrounding community. The goal is to provide concussions education for parents and youth sport leaders in the area along with Elon and surrounding university concussion researchers and practitioners. Some of the seminal work from Elon BrainCARE includes an evidence informed return to learn protocol for collegiate student-athletes and understanding modifiers that affect baseline performance and recovery from a concussive injury in neurocognition, balance, gait and symptom reporting. Elon BrainCARE Research Institute not only serves as a service to sports medicine and student health staff at Elon, but also a model of co-mentored undergraduate research training for students headed into both academic and clinical health profession fields. Book Description: Sports related concussions and the implications of short-and long-term outcomes is a concern to athletes, parents, coaches, academics, and health care professionals. Leading clinicians and scientists across a variety of fields have come together to collaborate around topics related to concussion education, assessment, management and treatment of head injuries that occur in sports. Athletes of all levels not only have to perform on the field, but may also have to perform in the classroom where symptoms of a concussion can have profound impacts. As health care professionals work to implement the best practices around concussive injuries, scientists assess outcomes, implications and emerging topics related to management and recovery. This book aims to gather leaders in the field of concussion assessment and management to highlight the state of evidence-based practice. In addition, authors explore emerging issues around the care of athletes in returning to play as well as returning to academic settings. Concussion assessment and management is not a one-size-fits-all concept, and topics around pre-existing factors like cultural, ethnic and sex differences are essential to consider as we attempt to change reporting behaviors and positively impact recovery and outcomes from injury. As new information continues to emerge, the education, assessment, management and treatment of concussion evolves with the health and safety of athletes taking a front seat. This book is a timely snapshot of concussion assessment and management, and it is also a leader in emerging issues in the ever-changing science and evidence-based practice of sport-related concussion research. Target Audience: This book is targeted for a wide audience including scientists and health professionals doing concussion work as well as students, parents, and newcomers to concussion education and research.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The story of how the NFL, over a period of nearly two decades, denied and sought to cover up mounting evidence of the connection between football and brain damage “League of Denial may turn out to be the most influential sports-related book of our time.”—The Boston Globe “Professional football players do not sustain frequent repetitive blows to the brain on a regular basis.” So concluded the National Football League in a December 2005 scientific paper on concussions in America’s most popular sport. That judgment, implausible even to a casual fan, also contradicted the opinion of a growing cadre of neuroscientists who worked in vain to convince the NFL that it was facing a deadly new scourge: a chronic brain disease that was driving an alarming number of players—including some of the all-time greats—to madness. In League of Denial, award-winning ESPN investigative reporters Mark Fainaru-Wada and Steve Fainaru tell the story of a public health crisis that emerged from the playing fields of our twenty-first-century pastime. Everyone knows that football is violent and dangerous. But what the players who built the NFL into a $10 billion industry didn’t know—and what the league sought to shield from them—is that no amount of padding could protect the human brain from the force generated by modern football, that the very essence of the game could be exposing these players to brain damage. In a fast-paced narrative that moves between the NFL trenches, America’s research labs, and the boardrooms where the NFL went to war against science, League of Denial examines how the league used its power and resources to attack independent scientists and elevate its own flawed research—a campaign with echoes of Big Tobacco’s fight to deny the connection between smoking and lung cancer. It chronicles the tragic fates of players like Hall of Fame Pittsburgh Steelers center Mike Webster, who was so disturbed at the time of his death he fantasized about shooting NFL executives, and former San Diego Chargers great Junior Seau, whose diseased brain became the target of an unseemly scientific battle between researchers and the NFL. Based on exclusive interviews, previously undisclosed documents, and private emails, this is the story of what the NFL knew and when it knew it—questions at the heart of a crisis that threatens football, from the highest levels all the way down to Pop Warner.

From youth football to the NFL, almost no one understands concussions. Children are dying, and NFL players are retiring early and with impairments. Why? The NFL suppresses the true information about head injuries. Nowinski shows how to recognize them, how long to stay out of action, and how to educate teams and players.

The spotlight on sports is brighter than ever, and the focus isn't just on the scores. This title takes a critical look at a challenging issue within the sports world, providing history and context while also examining key factors in the issue and how it is being addressed. This title is balanced and straightforward, and uses numerous examples to illuminate the issue. With a glossary, primary source sidebars, and additional resources, this title will keep readers engaged and up to date on the biggest concerns in sports today. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. SportsZone is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.

This practical reference, edited by Drs. Blessen C. Eapen and David X. Cifu, covers the full spectrum of assessment, management, and rehabilitation after concussion. It includes best practices and considerations for numerous patient populations and their unique needs in an easy-to-read, concise format. Geared toward physiatrists, neurologists, primary care physicians, and rehabilitation professionals, this book provides the key information you need to guide your treatment plans and help patients recover after concussion. Consolidates the most current information and guidance in this challenging and diverse area into one convenient resource. Covers acute management of concussions, diagnostic criteria, neuroimaging, biomarkers, chronic traumatic encephalopathy and return-to-play, school and duty protocols. Discusses special populations, including pediatrics, sports, military and veteran patients. Covers post-concussive syndrome and its management of sequelae after concussion.