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 Each
year, more than 750,000 Americans report injuries sustained during
recreational sports, with 82,000 involving brain injuries
Brain
injuries cause more deaths than any other sports injury. In
football for instance, brain injury accounts for 65 to 85 percent of
all fatalities.
A
State of Metabolic Crisis - Follow what happens to the brain
when it's subjected to an impact on the side of the head. (requires
the Flash
plug-in)
Signs of a concussion
-
vacant stare (befuddled facial expression)
-
delayed verbal and motor responses (slow to answer
questions or follow instructions)
-
confusion and inability to focus attention (easily
distracted and unable to follow through with normal activities)
-
disorientation (walking in the wrong direction,
unaware of time, date, and place)
-
slurred or incoherent speech (making disjointed or
incomprehensible statements)
-
gross observable incoordination (stumbling,
inability to walk tandem/straight line)
-
emotions out of proportion to circumstances
(distraught, crying for no reason)
-
memory deficits (exhibited by the athlete
repeatedly asking a question that has already been answered, or
inability to memorize and recall 3 of 3 words or 3 of three
objects in 5 minutes)
-
any period of loss of consciousness (paralytic
coma, unresponsiveness to attempted arousal)
Articles
A Perplexing
Foe Takes an Awful Toll from the New York Times May 11, 2000
Click on the
pictures below to see
statistics and articles for each
sport.
Hockey
"Heads
Up, Don't Duck!" Massachusetts Medical Society article
Water Recreation
National
Water Safety Program official web site
Sources for statistics are available from the BIA of AR
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