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July 29th, 2015
It won’t be long now before players begin lacing up their cleats for football and soccer season. The excitement and enthusiasm are typically palpable across local communities this time of year as players, coaches, families and fans start thinking about their favorite teams’ fall campaigns in these sports. Unfortunately, the fly in the ointment for these sports is the growing awareness of the substantial risk of concussions or, traumatic brain injuries, as they are commonly referenced in the medical community. The last 10 years has seen a virtual explosion in research and scientific understanding regarding the nature and cause of traumatic brain injuries and, seemingly with every new research study released, we come closer to the very sobering realization that the human brain is not nearly as tough or resilient as we would like to believe. Football and soccer, in particular, have proven to be fertile research fields to demonstrate that even a very small amount of force can cause very significant, sometimes life-changing, alterations to the human brain. In fact, according to Harvard Medical School, “traumatic brain injury is a leading cause of death and disability in children and young adults."
Recently, a new study out of the prestigious Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center has provided the first direct evidence linking traumatic brain injury to Alzheimer's disease and chronic traumatic encephalopathy (“CTE”), another type of degenerative brain disease that has been in the news quite a bit the last few years as more and more NFL players have been diagnosed with CTE. The researchers in this study found the link between traumatic brain injury and the development of these neurodegenerative diseases, in the form of a protein that is critical to proper brain function, called the tau protein. What the investigators discovered is that when the brain suffers a traumatic hit, these tau proteins become misshapen and the deformities in these tau proteins set into motion a destructive cascade of events that ultimately leads to widespread neurodegeneration and development of Alzheimer’s or CTE. Even more frightening the study found that the misshapen isoform of the tau protein can develop as soon as 12 hours after a traumatic brain injury and initiate the destructive cycle of neurodegeneration. That means that as early as the next morning after the big game win in which you got your bell rung, your brain could already be on a path towards a lifetime of pain and suffering.
However, it’s not all bad news out of Beth Israel, because those same researchers have developed a potent antibody that can selectively detect and destroy the highly toxic tau protein variant and prevent the onset of widespread neurodegeneration. The antibody works by identifying and neutralizing the toxic tau protein and restoring the brain cells’ structural and functional abilities. More research will undoubtedly be conducted and, hopefully clinical trials will be greenlit in the near future. But it appears that hope may be on the way for those of us unfortunate to sustain a traumatic brain injury from a car wreck, a fall or a contact sport.
For now, early recognition of the signs and symptoms of a concussion and a cessation of all activities that put the brain at further risk, remain our best hope to minimize the damage that can occur from even a relatively mild blow to the head. That was also confirmed by the researchers at Beth Israel, who also demonstrated that repetitive concussions, as can occur in contact sports, can result in “robust and persistent” negative changes to the tau protein. So it bears repeating that coaches, players and their family members should always err on the side of caution when it comes to the possibility that a player has sustained an on-field concussion from a football tackle, bumping heads with another soccer player or even something as seemingly benign as heading a soccer ball. Research has proven, time and time again, that it just doesn’t take much of a hit to damage the brain, and players who try to push through the injury to stay in the game for their team, put themselves at much greater risk for degenerative neurological disease down the road. Coaches, parents and players should all know how to readily recognize the telltale signs associated with a traumatic brain injury, including the:
Physical symptoms:
• headache
• dizziness or loss of balance
• fatigue or drowsiness
• difficulty sleeping
• nausea or vomiting
• uncoordination
• blurred vision or double vision
Cognitive symptoms:
• poor concentration
• short-term memory loss
• difficulty finding words
• trouble with multitasking
• change in school performance
and
Emotional symptoms:
• irritability
• sudden emotional outbursts
• anxiety
• depression
Remember that even the mildest of brain injuries is a serious medical condition and [one] should seek medical attention as soon as possible. So play hard and have fun this season, but also play smart. The best thing for a player suspected of having a concussion is to get them out of the game and have them evaluated as soon as possible by a competent doctor who focuses on brain injury medicine. No game win is worth the lifetime of losses that neurodegeneration can cause.
