Concussions, particularly in contact sports like football, have become an important topic of discussion. The Mayo Clinic classifies a concussion as a traumatic brain injury that alters the way your brain functions. Effects are usually temporary but can include headaches and problems with concentration, memory, balance and coordination.
Researchers have come together to form the Purdue Neurotrauma Group (PNG) and have thoroughly looked into the condition and how it affects the brain, particularly for youth.
The Recorder spoke with Eric Nauman, professor of mechanical engineering and biomedical engineering at Purdue University and a spokesman for PNG, and learned about unknown aspects of concussions.
Indianapolis Recorder Newspaper: Explain the purpose in forming PNG.
Nauman: We formed the Purdue Neurotrauma Group about seven years ago in an effort to try to understand how concussions happen — what it is about getting hit in the brain that turns into symptoms? We started by getting players’ preseason magnetic resonance images (MRI) and postseason MRIs and then also tracked every hit they took in practice and games.
What happens when a concussion occurs?
It all depends on what part of the brain is injured. Some (people) will become a little slower or not be able to learn as quickly, some are sensitive to light, some have a little bit of everything.
What did you find from your research?
About 10 percent of the players get a concussion in any given year, but over 50 percent of the players showed dramatic changes in the brain, but didn’t have any symptoms. You know it’s a concussion if you’re slurring your words or have balance problems. Your brain will go through great lengths to rewire itself so you can function up until it can’t do it anymore. It turns out that’s the case with most concussions. We also found that it’s not just the neurons that are damaged; it’s other cells that are impacted as well. Some recover and some don’t.
Football is obviously a very physical sport, so were your findings surprising?
It was surprising in the sense that people had been missing (this kind of data) for so long. Unlike most fields of medicine, people were assuming your only injury had obvious symptoms, but in a lot of branches of medicine like cancer, they realize you could have a tumor well before you have symptoms. So we came in and did the study correctly by getting pre and postseason data. We didn’t think what we were doing was that revolutionary at first, and now it seems like it’s changing.
What types of hits were players receiving to cause brain damage?
It turns out that no one has been able to find the type of hit that could cause concussions. But most of what we see is the result of medium-sized hits, 60 Gs or so. The Gs are a way to measure acceleration. The biggest one we’ve seen was 289 and that kid was fine, but we’ve seen people take a 240 and (they’re) concussed. That’s because they build up so much damage they cross a threshold. A rollercoaster is 5 or 6 Gs. A typical hit on a football field might be 30 or 40 Gs. We’ll often see 100 or so Gs at least once a game.
Who did you study?
Mostly high school football players and we did girls soccer. We also looked at Purdue’s women’s soccer team. We found the same thing for soccer, but we did find that the girls seemed to recover better. But it turns out some of the “headers” were around 100 Gs. So they’re taking hits like football players.
Do you think the research has hurt the game of football and soccer?
It may have hurt the game a little bit, but we haven’t come across many people who said they didn’t want their kid to play. The important thing to realize is that the game doesn’t have to be this way. In football, the technology is available to make helmets safer. But helmet companies don’t want to adapt.
Do more concussions happen at the high school level than professional level? These are grown men who are physically able to take a hit better than a 15-year-old.
You could argue that, but the NFL players are so much bigger, stronger and faster. It’s happening, but the one thing the NFL did was, they started limiting contact practices. High school only limits it a little bit and college doesn’t limit it at all.
How should families and coaching staff handle concussions?
Prevention is the best way to go, but if you are injured you’ve got to give your brain a chance to heal. It could take five months or more for their brain to return to normal, if it returns to normal.
For more information on Purdue Neurotrauma Group’s research, visit purdue.edu/research/png.
