More CTE evidence

[Fatty Liver]

58 minutes ago, bearpants said:

 

This got me thinking about rugby... for comparison sake, I wonder how many former or current pro rugby players are suffering from major brain injuries like we see in football... maybe it's a big deal but we don't hear much about it in NA...

This discussion gets rehashed every couple of months and I believe it's been pointed out that the rate of CTE is prevalent in rugby players as well.  It's not just the direct hits to the head but also the abrupt stopping action that causes the brain to slosh around like jello in a bowl that cause the damage. 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/11857548/Rugby-uncovered-Game-still-has-head-in-sand-over-the-risks-of-brain-damage.html

[LeBird]

It's a serious problem but I don't know if the results of the study should have been generalised. It's just like saying a study of people with cancer found that 19 out of 20 suffered from depression. They are all starting with a flawed sample.

 

[Fatty Liver]

5 minutes ago, LeBird said:

It's a serious problem but I don't know if the results of the study should have been generalised. It's just like saying a study of people with cancer found that 19 out of 20 suffered from depression. They are all starting with a flawed sample.

 

Sure, but hopefully the science will advance to the point that they can identify the damage without an autopsy.  Maybe MOS could volunteer.

[LeBird]

1 hour ago, Throw Long Bannatyne said:

Sure, but hopefully the science will advance to the point that they can identify the damage without an autopsy.  Maybe MOS could volunteer.

So I called Mike and asked him if he would mind a full lobotomy on Friday on loan for the weekend if they promise not to drop it. "Wouldn't that hurt?" "Not half as much as losing to Montreal".  Done.

[SpeedFlex27]

4 hours ago, Atomic said:

Weird that you know how to properly tackle but none of the coaches or players seem to.

Believe it or not, you aren't far from the truth. When players at lower levels aren't allowed to tackle each other & just tackle dummies in practices & most practices are shoulder pads & helmets or none at all, that's when players don't learn the proper fundamentals. Instead of learning the right way to tackle in practice instead they get hurt in games.

 

[Rod Black]

4 hours ago, HardCoreBlue said:

This looks encouraging.

http://www.cnn.com/videos/cnnmoney/2016/09/08/vicis-football-helmets-concussions-nfl-cnnmoney.cnn

(sorry if the link doesn't work, just go to the CNN website if interested)

Yeah, foam on the outside of the head.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/abigailtracy/2016/02/04/nfl-cte-football-concussions-injuries-helmet-vicis-zero1-super-bowl/#7d3e17ea5f05

 

ha, when I was younger it was foam, no it was whipped cream... different story.

[The Unknown Poster]

On 7/26/2017 at 8:36 AM, Atomic said:

At what point do we just stop with all the drama and say yes, football is dangerous.  There's a good chance you will suffer brain injuries if you play for an extended period.

If you drive a race car, you can get in a crash and die.

If you go skydiving, the parachute might not open and you could die.

If you are a fighter, any number of things can go wrong and you could die.

If you're a football player, you're putting yourself at risk of brain damage.

That's the risk.  Play or don't play.  No one is forcing anyone to do anything.

If you go Skydiving, the chance of the chute not opening are small but obviously catastrophic.  But thats not the same thing as playing a sport that is made as safe as possible, suffering only minor injuries and then suffering major brain issues later in life.

There is an issue of liability.  When you're 19, 20 etc and feel bullet proof and someone says, you know having multiple concussions could be a problem later, you brush it off.  When you're 50 and want to kill yourself you say "no one told us how bad it was" which is the crux of the NFL lawsuit.

I think the reason the NHL is fighting their lawsuit so hard (and while I agree with them in principal, I think Bettman has been wholly ridiculous in how he categorizes things), is studies like this dont tell us much at all.

There was a study on Rugby players that use comparisons to general public that found no greater degree of cognitive impairment.  So the possibility remains that everyone suffers these small concision-like injuries in our lives and if you examined the brains of the general public, they;d have just as many CTE sufferers.  The difference is, why do some have apparent cognitive issues and some dont?

(One study I saw linked it to steroid use).

[Tracker]

And, if at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you.

[Atomic]

1 hour ago, The Unknown Poster said:

If you go Skydiving, the chance of the chute not opening are small but obviously catastrophic.  But thats not the same thing as playing a sport that is made as safe as possible, suffering only minor injuries and then suffering major brain issues later in life.

There is an issue of liability.  When you're 19, 20 etc and feel bullet proof and someone says, you know having multiple concussions could be a problem later, you brush it off.  When you're 50 and want to kill yourself you say "no one told us how bad it was" which is the crux of the NFL lawsuit.

I think the reason the NHL is fighting their lawsuit so hard (and while I agree with them in principal, I think Bettman has been wholly ridiculous in how he categorizes things), is studies like this dont tell us much at all.

There was a study on Rugby players that use comparisons to general public that found no greater degree of cognitive impairment.  So the possibility remains that everyone suffers these small concision-like injuries in our lives and if you examined the brains of the general public, they;d have just as many CTE sufferers.  The difference is, why do some have apparent cognitive issues and some dont?

(One study I saw linked it to steroid use).

I can understand the issue in regards to people who played before and are now suffering health problems.  They legitimately didn't know.

But people know now.  You can't avoid hearing about the link between brain injuries and football/other sports.

Let's put our cards on the table.  This is football, this is how it's played, and it's a dangerous game.  You can, and almost certainly will, suffer serious injuries to your brain and body.  And that's okay, because you know it and you make the choice to play.  Just because something is dangerous doesn't mean it should be outlawed or changed.  Danger is okay when people know the risks.  They didn't know the risks before, but they do now.  Participate at your own discretion.

[The Unknown Poster]

Yes but the problem now could be the over-sensationalizing.  Because CTE is showing up in practically every athlete who's brain is donated, something is going on here.  if we ALL show CTE signs when we're 80, then that tells us this is not a sports-related phenomenon.  Its possible that there is no greater degree of dementia in athletes than non athletes.  Thats the research that needs to be done.

When they studied Chris Benoit's brain, they said he had the brain of a very old man with advanced dementia.  Well, despite murdering his wife and child he clearly was not acting like a very old man with advanced dementia. 

More research is needed.  In the case of the NFL, they withheld info from their players so they had to pay and rightfully so.  I disagree with older NHL players suing the league because the league didnt tell them facts that no one knew.  How can the NHL know what they dont know?  There was no fault on the NHL's part that they didnt know about CTE in the 70's.

But the NHL could be more supportive of brain research.

[Fatty Liver]

15 hours ago, LeBird said:

So I called Mike and asked him if he would mind a full lobotomy on Friday on loan for the weekend if they promise not to drop it. "Wouldn't that hurt?" "Not half as much as losing to Montreal".  Done.

Seriously, they should be able to come up with some kind of scan or use density or fluid testing to detect these damaged cells unobtrusively for diagnosis.  I think within 10 years this will be a done deal, the problem so far is that this is an area of medical research that has been abused and neglected as the movie about concussions showed.

[TBURGESS]

Quote

Alosco and his colleagues studied the brains of 202 deceased players of American football across all levels of play, including those who participated in football before high school, in high school, semi professionally, in the Canadian Football League and in the NFL. All the players involved in the study had donated their brains for research.

Overall, 87 percent — or 177 players — had CTE. But the rate was significantly higher — 99 percent — in former NFL players. On average, participants with mild signs of CTE had played for 13 years, while subjects with severe CTE had careers lasting 15.8 years.

From: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/new-study-teaches-us-football-brain-disease/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=pbsofficial&utm_campaign=newshour

 

[HardCoreBlue]

8 hours ago, Atomic said:

I can understand the issue in regards to people who played before and are now suffering health problems.  They legitimately didn't know.

But people know now.  You can't avoid hearing about the link between brain injuries and football/other sports.

Let's put our cards on the table.  This is football, this is how it's played, and it's a dangerous game.  You can, and almost certainly will, suffer serious injuries to your brain and body.  And that's okay, because you know it and you make the choice to play.  Just because something is dangerous doesn't mean it should be outlawed or changed.  Danger is okay when people know the risks.  They didn't know the risks before, but they do now.  Participate at your own discretion.

I think what some of us are saying is yes you are right, people playing the sport know the risk and make the choice to play.  A lot of us love watching and playing aggressive, violent hard hitting football and don't want that taken away. However the issue we are discussing is at the grassroots level numbers are continually going down which may eventually lead not having enough players to field teams at the atom, peewee and bantam levels. Alberta has followed suit with other provinces in going 6 v 6 at the atom level to help with numbers, development and safety. I was at a meeting a couple of months ago with football Canada in attendance and they let us know that the peewee and bantam levels rosters must be at 25 or you can't field a team. The argument here less numbers more chance for injuries. They have suggested peewee might go to 9 v 9 to help with this. Therefore football is being forced/encouraged to change the way football has been traditionally taught e.g., teaching players not to tackle with the head leading to get the head out of the game. Obviously this hasn't reached the pro level (and it may never due to a lot of other issues but primarily being revenue) but we're talking generations down the road and what that will look like.

If the number of kids wanting to play football continues to dry up there is legitimate concern for the future of our great sport of football. I remember how upset I was when my kid got called for blowing up a  a defensive player who was focussed on the ball carrier and didn't see my son coming. It was a clean block but the rule that has been put in place is a player can't lower his shoulder into the oppositions's chest if that player is in a vulnerable position regardless if it is a clean block and is close to the ball carrier. Me being upset at this as a dad and as a coach is a moot point if eventually not enough youth play football that will catch up to us at some point.

Alternately just build a damn good football helmet and some/most of this goes away. (maybe not, that's a whole different discussion).