NFL Concussions and Their Long-Term Effects Essay

On May 2, 2012, the National football League addled nonp atomic number 18il of its elite players to felo-de-se Junior Seau. Seau played for the Chargers, Dolphins, and the Patriots during his professional football plot of ground plucky career and was a 12-time Pro Bowler be prow retiring in 2009. Three years after his retirement however, Seau committed suicide by shooting himself in the chest with a gun. This greatly shocked the football world and its image of Junior Seau as a person, but it shortly realized the cause for his action. Shortly after Seaus death, researchers examined Seaus promontoryer and undercoat that it contained a distemper knget as chronic traumatic encephalopathy which is formed by repeated blows to the chieftain a real common disease among fountain football players (Football Brains). The Seau family then filed a practice against the NFL claiming that the confederacy held back randomness from the players virtually the danger of continuous blow s to the head (Seaus final stage on Brain Injuries). Since the formation of the National Football League in 1920, the popularity of the sport has prominent tremendously over the years. It seems at present that much and more people are getting interested in the NFL, whether it is talking about their favorite team at work or at school or watching them play on game day. However, on the flip side of all the amazing catches and touchd admits, there is a dark side to the NFL cognise as the lash problem.This problem has grown so much over the years that there render been more than 4200 lawsuits by former and current players against the NFL stating that the NFL has been trying to cover up the deadly gigantic term effects of concussions and also relied on NFL doctors to feed them the breeding they wanted to hear while rejecting the studies make by researches showing the yearn term effects concussions have on the hit (Junior Seaus Death Keeps Spotlight on Brain Injuries). In orde r for the NFL to keep stentorian the way it is right now, the league had to reject the information shown by researchers which showed the disadvantageous effects of concussions in the long run and instead had to hire their own doctors to say that concussions are minor and cause no detrimental long run effects. I believe that repetitive concussions do cause health problems in the future for NFL players and that the NFL covered up the truth about concussions. world that I watch the NFL regularly, it seems like it is al approximately guaranteed that at least one or more players will experience a concussion during the game with all the physical contact taking place. Some of the concussions these players experience are obvious in that they are transactionless on the ground and nearly are not so obvious in that they are lighten able to make it to the bench. check to Jennifer Car of BrainFacts.org, a concussion is caused when the head is struck violently which then leads to a brief d isruption in encephalon activity. When the head is struck suddenly, the brain is set in motion and bangs the skulls rough and ragged inside which causes the brain cells to stretch and sometimes even split (Mild Brain Injury and disaster).Michael Collins, a clinical psychologist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center who specializes in sports-related concussions, states that a concussion is basically an muscularity crisis to the brain cells and he also states that the brain has to work much harder to answer tasks (Hard Knocks The skill of Concussions). This disruption posterior cause an individual to experience a variety of different symptoms in the pursuance minutes and hours. The range of symptoms includes the following nausea, vomiting, brief loss of consciousness, and dizziness (Hard Knocks The attainment of Concussions). Later symptoms include lightheadedness, depression, anxiety, sonority in the ears, constant migraine headaches, and poor concentration or help (Mild Brain Injury and Concussion).The symptoms mentioned in the previous paragraph may death a couple days to a few weeks at most a few months. Those who experience these types of symptoms usually receive a concussion maybe once or twice in their lifetimes. However, those professional athletes competing in sports with a good deal of physical contact are in harms way of experiencing quintuple concussions during their career as an athlete. According to recent research, scientists have discovered a neurodegenerative disease also known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy or CTE (Hard Knocks The Science of Concussions). This disease was found in the brains of former athletes who have died mainly boxers and football players (What is CTE?). These athletes were those whohave received continuous concussions or played in positions where they were endangered to experience a good amount of physical impact (Hard Knocks The Science of Concussions). The repeated banging of the brain against t he skull causes a gradual degeneration of the brain tissue, and also the forming of an unusual protein known as tau (What is CTE?). These activities in the brain can take place months or even years after the get concussion or retirement from the sport. Some of the symptoms associated with CTE include memory loss, confusion, depression, aggression, hindered judgment, and craziness (What is CTE?).There is definitely state of the symptoms of CTE among former NFL players. There are many another(prenominal) examples of former NFL players who have suffered from CTE and have killed themselves and/or those around them including the Junior Seau suicide event that was mentioned in the opening paragraph. The first example is John Grimsley, who was a former Houston Oilers linebacker. Grimsley shot himself by accident while he was cleanup spot his gun one day (Football Brains). The former NFL player was a experienced outdoorsman and should have easily performed the task of cleaning his gun . A second example is Justin Strzelczyk, who was a former offensive lineman for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Strzelczyk was involved in a high-speed hit-and-run chase with the police which turned into a fervent crash where he eventually died (Football Brains). Another example is former Canadian professional wrestler Chris Benoit who murdered his wife and child and then took his own life (Football Brains).The final example is Tom McHale, who was a former Tampa quest Buccaneer. He died at the age of 45 from a drug dose (Football Brains). All the brains of these former professional athletes were taken for theater and all their brains were found to contain the brain disease CTE in them (Football Brains). Another study was done on the affects of repeated concussions causing CTE by Ann McKee. According to Ann McKee, who is a neuropathologist at Bedford VA Medical Center, brains of patients with CTE have unique patterns of abnormal protein tangles and cell loss (Hard Knocks The Science of Concussions). Her study analyzed the brains of former athletes and war veterans who have experienced multiple brain injuries. McKees research showed that out of the 85 brains she has studied, 68 of the brains contained the brain disease CTE (Hard Knocks The Science ofConcussions). There is extensive research still organism done by scientists in the area of CTE and if there is a tie-in amongst repeated blows to the head and the formation of CTE in the brain. In situation the National Football League has unflinching to donate $30 cardinal to the National Institutes of Healths Neurology Institute to help foster studies on concussions among football players and military troops (NFL Donates $30 Million To Concussion Research).More and more research and evidence on concussions is being brought to the fore front, as well as the numerous tragedies that occurred among former NFL players stemming from repeated concussions. Because of this, the NFL league and the NFL Mild traumatic Brain Injury delegation secretly decided to cover up and put down all the extensive studies and findings that have been recently popping up by scientists outside the NFL. In the phosphate buffer solution TV documentary League of Denial, the NFL is portrayed as a covetous money-driven industry that would do anything to keep the league from falling apart, even to the design of withholding information from players about the long-term consequences from repeated blows to the head. In this film, the smudge is cast on Dr. Bennett Omalu who was the first scientist to discover CTE (NFL Concussion Cover-up). His findings of CTE came from the brains of former Pittsburgh Steeler Mike Webster and his teammate Terry Long. Dr. Omalus findings were tremendously influential because it was the brightness for the connection between repetitive blows to the head and CTE. However, as Dr. Omalu began publishing his findings about CTE in the brains of Webster and Long, the NFL soon noticed his findings and took action.Dr. Omalu recalled a conversion he had with a NFL doctor in which the NFL doctor said, Dr. Omalu, do you know the consequences of what you are doing? If 10 percent of mothers in America started to view football as a dangerous sport, it would be the end of football (NFL Concussion Cover-up). This simply shows that NFL doctors realize that the findings between multiple concussions and CTE are true, but they are loth to admit to it because they are afraid that the NFL will dissolve into nothing if the truth is discovered. The NFL realized that the league was in jeopardy so they decided to publically denounce the findings of Dr. Omalu by saying that his work was flawed. However, this was not the only guarantee that the NFL made it trying to putdown the findings from scientists on the connection between repetitive concussions and CTE. In a 2007 meeting with the NFLs Mild Traumatic Brain Injury committee, Julian Bailes who is the top neurosurgeon at the Northshore neurolo gic Institute, displayed several pictures of CTE that was almost certainly caused by frequent concussions.However, the chairman of the committee downplayed all the evidence that was shown to them by Julian Bailes even though the evidence was pretty clear. The Commissioner of the NFL, Roger Goodell, decided that it was best for the league to conduct its own study about concussions. He released the following statements regarding the evidence being shown to the league by outside doctors and researchers, You have to grammatical construction at their entire medical write up. To look at something that is isolated without looking at their entire medical history I think is irresponsible (NFL Covering Up Research?). From respectable this one instance, we can definitely see that the NFL is trying its best to handle the clear-cut evidence about the connection between repetitive concussions and CTE. It seems as though the Commissioner and the head of the NFL Brain Injury committee realize t hat the information and the research that was showed to them was true so they had to make sure it did not disclose out to the players and also to the media.