4 ms·

The thing you're missing is Chronic traumatic encephalopathy. The current theory is that CTE can be caused by the constant repeated non-concussive hits unique t

by learc83 12y ago

The thing you're missing is Chronic traumatic encephalopathy. The current theory is that CTE can be caused by the constant repeated non-concussive hits unique to football (at least among popular American sports), so analyzing concussion rate really isn't helpful. >A brain injury study conducted at the Boston University School of Medicine showed that 33 of 34 players tested post-mortem showed clear signs of CTE.[1] Even when you account for selection bias the number of NFL players with CTE is insane. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NFL_players_with_chronic_traumatic_encephalopathy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NFL_players_with_chroni...

jessriedel 12y ago
Ahh, good, yes CTE is at least a more interesting critique. However, I believe the non-concussive theory is purely a conjecture at this point. This is one of the authors of that Boston study: "While it remains unknown what level of exposure to brain trauma is required to trigger CTE, there is no available evidence that occasional, isolated or well-managed concussions give rise to CTE," one of the study's co-authors, Dr. Robert Cantu, said in a press release. So basically, you're just stuck with your priors on this one. As far as I am aware, CTE data doesn't provide you with any additional evidence for non-concussive effects beyond what you could have conjectured pre-CTE. Of course, the media has breathlessly reported on how NFL players are all commiting CTE-induced suicide despite the fact that the NFL suicide rate is less than half the rate of the general population... http://loyolamedicine.org/newswire/news/little-evidence-retired-nfl-players-more-likely-suffer-cte-loyola-doctor-says http://loyolamedicine.org/newswire/news/little-evidence-reti...
- learc83 12y ago
  That quote doesn't say anything about non-concussive hits. "there is no available evidence that occasional, isolated or well-managed concussions give rise to CTE," He said there was no evidence for occasional concussions, he didn't say anything about repeated non-concussive injuries. Here's a quote from the BU CTE center "We believe CTE is caused by repetitive brain trauma. This trauma includes both concussions that cause symptoms and subconcussive hits to the head that cause no symptoms." [1] I'm a big guy and I live in the south, so you can bet I played my share of football growing up--there are definitely a lot more repeated hits to the head in football than any other popular youth sport. [1] http://www.bu.edu/cte/about/frequently-asked-questions/ http://www.bu.edu/cte/about/frequently-asked-questions/
  - jessriedel 12y ago
    Good point. Thanks for the correction. The fact they're finding it in many other sports and in military personnel, as pointed out in the FAQ, makes me pretty skeptical that this is a disease strongly linked to nonconcussive hits since hockey players and soldiers aren't butting heads every day. But it's pretty hard to draw conclusions while the data and definitions are so vague. Do you know if they've looked specifically at populations of long-time football players with no concussions? A review article from 2012 had this to say > While it is clear that anyone who suffers repeated head trauma, regardless of the mechanism, may carry the risk of developing CTE, there is no clear consensus on how much or how little trauma is needed to cause CTE. While most feel CTE is a manifestation of repetitive trauma, the question still stands if it can be caused by a single TBI [10]. In a study by Johnson et al., widespread tau and beta-amyloid deposition was found in the brains of individuals who suffered a single traumatic brain injury. The study included the examination of postmortem brains from long-term survivors (1–47 years) of a single TBI () versus uninjured age-matched controls (). Results showed NFTs to be exceptionally rare in young uninjured controls, yet were abundant and diffuse in one-third of TBI cases. http://www.hindawi.com/journals/rerp/2012/816069/ http://www.hindawi.com/journals/rerp/2012/816069/ The last sentence seems to support the idea that the appearance of symptoms is an important threshold, but it's hard to tell what they mean; could also be that anyone cracking heads enough to get sub-concussive CTE are likely to have picked up at least one full concussion. > I'm a big guy and I live in the south, so you can bet I played my share of football growing up--there are definitely a lot more repeated hits to the head in football than any other popular youth sport I played 11 years of football, mostly on defense and mostly with my head, and I fully agree. I coach youth football, so any data that would show a dramatically higher risk for football than other sports (which are generally regarded as acceptably risky) is of great interest to me.
kasey_junk 12y ago
There is a lot of evidence mounting that CTE is a problem in soccer as well. Not from head to head collisions but as a sort of repetitive stress injury from heading the ball. Teams are starting to put players, especially at the youth level, on header counts during practice to mitigate this. As I see it there are a variety of ways to become injured in sports: - traumatic injury such as concussion, spinal injury, torn ligaments, broken bones, etc. - repetitive stress injuries such as CTE, tendinitis, stress fractures, etc. - what I'll call body stress injuries. Things like putting on too much weight for your frame to play lineman in football, extreme weight dropping for weight class sports, or the extreme oddities professional cyclists put themselves through for an advantage. Nearly every sport you play has some chance of having injuries in at least one of these categories. The problem is that football has a high likely hood of injuries in all of these categories, and at the worst case of the injury in the category.

by learc83 12y ago

jessriedel 12y ago

Ahh, good, yes CTE is at least a more interesting critique. However, I believe the non-concussive theory is purely a conjecture at this point. This is one of the authors of that Boston study: "While it remains unknown what level of exposure to brain trauma is required to trigger CTE, there is no available evidence that occasional, isolated or well-managed concussions give rise to CTE," one of the study's co-authors, Dr. Robert Cantu, said in a press release. So basically, you're just stuck with your priors on this one. As far as I am aware, CTE data doesn't provide you with any additional evidence for non-concussive effects beyond what you could have conjectured pre-CTE. Of course, the media has breathlessly reported on how NFL players are all commiting CTE-induced suicide despite the fact that the NFL suicide rate is less than half the rate of the general population... http://loyolamedicine.org/newswire/news/little-evidence-retired-nfl-players-more-likely-suffer-cte-loyola-doctor-says http://loyolamedicine.org/newswire/news/little-evidence-reti...

learc83 12y ago
That quote doesn't say anything about non-concussive hits. "there is no available evidence that occasional, isolated or well-managed concussions give rise to CTE," He said there was no evidence for occasional concussions, he didn't say anything about repeated non-concussive injuries. Here's a quote from the BU CTE center "We believe CTE is caused by repetitive brain trauma. This trauma includes both concussions that cause symptoms and subconcussive hits to the head that cause no symptoms." [1] I'm a big guy and I live in the south, so you can bet I played my share of football growing up--there are definitely a lot more repeated hits to the head in football than any other popular youth sport. [1] http://www.bu.edu/cte/about/frequently-asked-questions/ http://www.bu.edu/cte/about/frequently-asked-questions/
- jessriedel 12y ago
  Good point. Thanks for the correction. The fact they're finding it in many other sports and in military personnel, as pointed out in the FAQ, makes me pretty skeptical that this is a disease strongly linked to nonconcussive hits since hockey players and soldiers aren't butting heads every day. But it's pretty hard to draw conclusions while the data and definitions are so vague. Do you know if they've looked specifically at populations of long-time football players with no concussions? A review article from 2012 had this to say > While it is clear that anyone who suffers repeated head trauma, regardless of the mechanism, may carry the risk of developing CTE, there is no clear consensus on how much or how little trauma is needed to cause CTE. While most feel CTE is a manifestation of repetitive trauma, the question still stands if it can be caused by a single TBI [10]. In a study by Johnson et al., widespread tau and beta-amyloid deposition was found in the brains of individuals who suffered a single traumatic brain injury. The study included the examination of postmortem brains from long-term survivors (1–47 years) of a single TBI () versus uninjured age-matched controls (). Results showed NFTs to be exceptionally rare in young uninjured controls, yet were abundant and diffuse in one-third of TBI cases. http://www.hindawi.com/journals/rerp/2012/816069/ http://www.hindawi.com/journals/rerp/2012/816069/ The last sentence seems to support the idea that the appearance of symptoms is an important threshold, but it's hard to tell what they mean; could also be that anyone cracking heads enough to get sub-concussive CTE are likely to have picked up at least one full concussion. > I'm a big guy and I live in the south, so you can bet I played my share of football growing up--there are definitely a lot more repeated hits to the head in football than any other popular youth sport I played 11 years of football, mostly on defense and mostly with my head, and I fully agree. I coach youth football, so any data that would show a dramatically higher risk for football than other sports (which are generally regarded as acceptably risky) is of great interest to me.

kasey_junk 12y ago

There is a lot of evidence mounting that CTE is a problem in soccer as well. Not from head to head collisions but as a sort of repetitive stress injury from heading the ball. Teams are starting to put players, especially at the youth level, on header counts during practice to mitigate this. As I see it there are a variety of ways to become injured in sports: - traumatic injury such as concussion, spinal injury, torn ligaments, broken bones, etc. - repetitive stress injuries such as CTE, tendinitis, stress fractures, etc. - what I'll call body stress injuries. Things like putting on too much weight for your frame to play lineman in football, extreme weight dropping for weight class sports, or the extreme oddities professional cyclists put themselves through for an advantage. Nearly every sport you play has some chance of having injuries in at least one of these categories. The problem is that football has a high likely hood of injuries in all of these categories, and at the worst case of the injury in the category.