When you hit your head, it hurts a lot, and you are probably a bit dazed. When a 200 lb linebacker smashes against your head, it is probably going to do a little more than hurt. One of the biggest issues in professional sports today is concussions. More often we are hearing about athletes who are forced to sit out for concussions. But come on, he just has a headache right? He can totally play through that. Well in the article we read recently about the pathophysiology of concussive brain injuries, we learned that concussions are actually pretty serious. First, concussions are often referred to as mild traumatic brain injuries (mTBI). Now it may just be me but I don’t think any traumatic brain injury is mild. What basically happens with a concussion is that when you get hit hard enough, the membranes of your neurons become “leaky”. This means ions like sodium and potassium start to leak out of your cells and your neurons begin to fire. In order to counteract all this, Na/K pumps in your neurons being working overtime to try and get your system back in balance. This requires a large amount of ATP or energy to work. This also leads to swelling of the brain. So basically, your brain takes a hit, begins firing random signals, and has to work overtime to balance it all out. All this leads to the symptoms associated with a concussion: memory loss, confusion, headache, trouble concentrating, etc. The thing about this kind of injury to the brain is, the only thing you can do about it is rest. It takes time to balance out and repair this damage. Besides just sending out a person with a out-of-whack brain back into a game, the big danger of concussion is second impact syndrome. Basically, if you take another hit of enough force too soon after a concussion, you run a major risk of causing a cerebral edema, major brain damage, or death. So maybe we should be keeping athletes off the field after concussions. But this isn’t exactly easy. Imagine if Aaron Rodgers or Adrian Peterson were to take a big hit in the playoffs. Without either of them, their teams would be in big trouble, not to mention would lose a lot of money. Do you let them play? Was the hit that bad? It’s not completely black and white. It is even worse for student athletes. Athletes in college or high school aren’t getting paid to put their bodies on the line, they do it for the love of the sport. But at the end of the day, they have to go back to school. Going to school with a concussion is basically impossible, you just wont be able to pay attention and comprehend what you are learning. This is especially difficult in college where classes are much more difficult and move much faster. But what do we do? One concussion and you are done? That won’t fly with a lot of teams. It isn’t an easy problem to solve. I may not have the answer but I do know that concussions cannot be taken lightly. An injury to your brain requires a lot of time to heal. Athletes are varying levels have their own motivation to keep playing but at some point we have to ask, when is it time to say enough?
