Impact of Traumatic Brain Injuries on Athletes Lives

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Abstract
Sport-related injuries can have a huge impact of a persons life as the person may experience
many different symptoms either if it is a concussion or a traumatic brain injury. A traumatic brain
injury is a nondegenerative, noncongenital insult to the brain from an external mechanical force,
possibly leading to permanent or temporary impairment of cognitive, physical, and psychosocial
functions, with an associated diminished or altered state of consciousness. Part of participating in
sports can have an effect of being injured however traumatic brain injuries can have an impact of
the athletes life. In conducting this literature review, the questions are how common is a
traumatic brain injury to occur during a sport, how can traumatic brain injuries be prevented
during the participation of a sport, what are the long term effects of suffering from a TBI, and
what sport causes the most TBI? These questions will help on to explain how much huge of an
impact concussions can cause when participating in sports, assuming there is an impact. After
researching from many articles, journals, and videos it was made evident that the brain does not
always function the same as it once had meaning the person will not be able to continue to live
their life as before. An increasing number of athletes have suffered from traumatic brain injuries
which never return to play again and may suffer fro dementia or memory loss, all depending on
the severity of the accident.

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Literature Review
To determine how severe traumatic brain injuries impact an athletes life first it would
need to be explained how a TBI affects the brain. This injury on the brain is a nondegenerative,
noncongenital insult from an external mechanical force, possibly leading to permanent or
temporary impairment of cognitive, physical, and psychosocial functions, with an associated
diminished or altered state of consciousness. Traumatic brain injuries have increased with the
participation of sports. As many sports involve contact with other players this then can lead to
many injuries. There has been more research done to investigate what can be done about all these
injuries. To investigate if traumatic brain injuries are an issue with the sports community the
questions which I will focus on are what are the short and long term effects of suffering from a
TBI, how can traumatic brain injuries be prevented during the participation of a sport, what sport
causes the most TBI, and how common is a traumatic brain injury to occur during a sport?
Research has been done to explain how traumatic brain injuries can possibly be prevented to
avoid a critical accident towards the life of an athlete.
The topic of traumatic brain injuries has been explained through the use of journals which
expands the comprehension on the issue and how an athletes life is impacted. One of the
journals compares the acute and chronic injuries, Acute brain injury in sports-related trauma
may lead to concussion, sub-concussion, hemorrhage or other structural brain damages. The
chronic consequence of TBI is CTE, a neurodegenerative condition, in which progressive clinical
symptoms often begin several years after retiring from the sport with abnormal tau accumulation
as the istological hallmark(Ling, Hardy, & Zetterberg, 2015). The article points out the short

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and long term neurological consequences of sport-related traumatic brain injuries. However, it is
hoped to avoid the effects by finding preventions to injuries while playing a sport. It is now
evident that traumatic brain injuries will impact an athletes life wether it is at an extend of an
acute or chronic injury.
To go into detail how even acute brain injuries can still have huge consequences on the
brain the journal continues to explain the serious outcomes. The statistical information which is
provided are that, In the United States, there have been 133 catastrophic brain injuries registered
among non-professional American football players since 1982: 90% were high school athletes
and 8% were college players" (Ling, Hardy, & Zetterberg, 2015). To understand how severe the
catastrophic brain injuries are the journal explained that Catastrophic brain injuries refer to
severe brain trauma associated with intracranial bleeding or cerebral contusions which may result
in death or long term neurological sequelae (Ling, Hardy, & Zetterberg). A catastrophic brain
injury is one of the many possible outcomes of an acute brain injury. Although it is referred to an
acute brain injury the effects can still be deadly and affect the normal function of the brain.
The chronic injuries which are known to be more severe as they affect the white matter in
the brain may result in dementia, mood disorders, or suicide. A study found 68 out of 85 (80%)
participants with histories of repetitive e head injury had CTE pathology ((Ling, Hardy, &
Zetterberg). This would indicate that even after suffering from a TBI the long term effects will
continue to affect the person. Athletes will not be able to continue to play the sport which they
once loved to play. It may become very difficult for them as they had suffered from an
impairment in the brain.

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To understand why traumatic brain injuries will impact the normal daily tasks of an
athlete, it must be made aware how the brain functions during a traumatic brain injury. A blow to
the head can be very disruptive as When subjected to rapid acceleration, deceleration and
rotational forces, the brain and all its components including neurons, glial cells and blood vessels
are stretched, which may disrupt their normal functions. Axons that span long distances from the
cell bodies are particularly susceptible to stretching, which may lead to diffuse axonal injury, a
basis for the symptoms experienced in concussion ((Ling, Hardy, & Zetterberg, 2015). This type
of altered function is common when suffering from any type of acute injury while the chronic
injuries the brain will experience, Marked atrophy of the medial temporal lobe, thalamus,
hypothalamus and mammillary bodies becomes evident in advanced CTE (Ling, Hardy, &
Zetterberg). This type of altercation to these regions of the brain would indicate cognitive and
memory impairment which would be an indicator for dementia, memory loss, concentration
impairment, attention deficit, and executive dysfunction.
A article which also discusses how suffering from traumatic brain injuries will impact the
future life of athletes was conducted from doing research on five retired NFL players. The
research discovered that, three players had mild cognitive impairment, one had dementia and
another had normal cognitive function(Champeau, 2013) which indicates the damage which the
athletes have suffered from experiencing a brain injury. This research further proves that
suffering from traumatic brain injuries can be very dangerous and change the life of an athlete
and cause a person to never be able to play that same sport again. The research however, is
mostly done on retired football players as football is a contact sport which can result in many
injuries.

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Another journal explained how traumatic brain injuries could be prevented while playing
one of the most common sports being injured, during football. One of the best tips given wasthat
football players should receive adequate preconditioning, and strengthening of the head and
neck muscles(NA, 2014) to avoid damage to the head. As well as another prevention tip being,
coaches must be prepared for a possible catastrophic spinal cord injury. The entire staff must
know what to do in such a case; being prepared and well informed might make all the difference
in preventing permanent disability(NA, 2014) as the injuries are very common. With this
journal it can be seen that many injuries have been caused, however there are forms of
prevention to decrease the number of sport-related injuries. The players and coaches just need to
be informed about how to correctly use their muscles and how to act in a situation in which
someone will be injured. A website which gives more information on prevention states seven
suggestions to reduce risks of traumatic brain injuries in sports. While head injuries in sports
cannot be prevented entirely, experts believe - and emerging science supports the view - that
there are seven principal ways to reduce the risk of brain injury from playing contact and
collision sports:Better training and coaching; Better enforcement of existing rules and rule
changes; Reducing repetitive head impacts in tackle football through limits on full-contact
practices; Better equipment; Neck strengthening;Head impact exposure monitoring; and
Delaying start of contact and collision sports (De Lench, nd). These suggestions are the best
possible form to attempt to reduce all type of injuries from while playing a sport.
In case that an athlete has suffered from a traumatic brain injury treatment must be
undertaken for a better outcome to the life of the athlete. Depending on how traumatic the blow
to the brain was the physician will decide what the better type of treatment is, In the case of the

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intracranial haematoma, definitive surgical evacuation is indicated, and in cases of the closed
head injuries and more severe degrees of concussion, observation is appropriate, with careful
neurological monitoring (Cantu, R. C. n.d.). Treatment can help the athletes with recuperating
and hopefully returning to their normal lives, however that is not always the case. The treatment
for the person will allow them to save their lives, although the athletes will have altercations to
their brain which will not function it the way it once did.
The final journal discussed what sports cause the most traumatic brain injuries and the
statistics with regarding to athletes. Many athletes play dangerous sports which involve contact
with one another or with hard objects such as a ball. The research done concluded that During
the study period, 1936 concussions were reported during 7,780,064 athlete-exposures (AEs) for
an overall injury rate of 2.5 per 10,000 AEs... The majority of concussions resulted from
participation in football (47.1%, n = 912), followed by girls' soccer (8.2%, n = 159), boys'
wrestling (5.8%, n = 112), and girls' basketball (5.5%, n = 107) (Marar, McIlvain, Fields &
Comstock, 2012). The statistics provided proved to show that football is the most common sport
to lead to traumatic brain injuries as there is player-to-player contact. The journal also explained
how it was most common for the players to return to play in one to three weeks with the average
being 55.3%. (Marar, Mcllvain, Fields, & Comstock) All injuries will vary by the sport, gender,
and type of exposure which is how research has helped in studying what are the best methods to
prevent any type of exposures to head injuries.
The image represented underneath explains how common a traumatic brain injury is to
occur during a sport. As football is the most common sport to have athletes suffering from head

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injuries the statistics demonstrate how the number of concussions has been increasing
throughout the years. More and more players seem to be suffering and having to live their lives
with a brain which does not function as it once used to because of the head trauma.

Conclusion
After understanding how traumatic brain injuries affect the brain it was made clear that
they will impact the person. Any part of the brain that is altered can lead to serious consequences
and affect daily simple tasks. The first journal which was used helped to explain the acute and
chronic injuries which were to inform athletes of all the effects they will experience if the were
to suffer from a head injury. Both of the short and long term effects which would be experienced
would have an impact on the life of the athlete as they would not be able to continue to play the

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sport which they are involved in and may even have a serious consequence of resulting in a fatal
accident. This journal was also able to answer the question dealing with the effects of traumatic
brain injuries. The next article was also useful to explain how retired NFL players even after time
had passed from their accident continue to suffer from the head injury as the brain never
recuperated from the accident. The question about the preventions of traumatic brain injuries was
answered with two separate journals. Although sports do involve player to player contact injuries
K. Guskiewicz (Author). can be avoided, however, both the player and the coach need to be
made aware of any form to prevent a concussion from occurring. The final article was used to
indicate that football was the most common sport to cause any type of head injury. As this is the
reality coaches should attempt to inform themselves about the prevention of these types of
injuries. As stated in the image which provides evidence by answering the last question of how
common it would be to suffer from a traumatic brain injury which has been increasing
throughout the years.
By analyzing all of the support viewed it has been made evident that traumatic brain
injuries either being acute or chronic will have an impact on an athletes life. The outcome will
be negative as the athletes can suffer severely as the brain may not function the same. It is
becoming a concern that throughout the years instead of decreasing these types of injuries they
have bee increasing which leads to a number of questions. One can wonder if sports are
becoming more violent than they once used to be as more athletes seem to be suffering from
concussions. Although there are many suggestions for the preventions the athletes still continue
to suffer from impacts to their heads. New rules should be made in sports such as football which

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is the most common sport with a high percentage of concussions during one game to lead to an
injury. The sport community should be aware that traumatic brain injuries have been increasing
and impacting the lives of many athletes.

References
Cantu, R. C. (n.d.). Head injuries in sport. Retrieved April 1, 2016, from
http://bjsm.bmj.com/content/30/4/289.long

Champeau, R., I. (2013, January 22). UCLA study first to image concussion-related abnormal
brain proteins in retired NFL players. Retrieved March 30, 2016, from
http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/ucla-researchers-first-to-image-242445

Concussion Incidence in the NFL [Photograph]. (2015, September 30). SlideShare In K.

Guskiewicz (Author).
De Lench, B. (n.d.). Seven Ways To Reduce Risk of Traumatic Brain Injury In Sports.
Retrieved March 30, 2016, from http://www.momsteam.com/health-safety/seven-waysto- reduce-risk-of-brain-trauma-in-contact-and-collision-sports

Ling, H., Hardy, J., & Zetterberg, H. (2015). Neurological consequences of traumatic brain
injuries in sports. Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience, 66, 114-122. Retrieved from
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S104474311500041X

Marar M1, McIlvain NM, Fields SK, Comstock RD. (2012, April). Epidemiology of concussions
among United States high school athletes in 20 sports. Retrieved from
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22287642
N. (2014, August). The American Association of Neurological Surgeons. Retrieved March 30,
2016, Retrieved from
http://www.aans.org/patientinformationconditionsandtreatments/sportsrelatedheadinjury.
aspx