Football Concussions: Prevention, Diagnosis, and Recovery

The topic of football concussions is a controversial one. If you’re a football player worried about the long-term health of your brain, it can be confusing to wade through all the information out there. Opinions range anywhere from people claiming that all the worry about football concussions is ruining the game to those who want to ban tackle football, for children (since kids who play tackle football sustain 15 times more head impacts than children who play flag football, according to the CDC).

In the past, “getting your bell rung” was nothing out of the ordinary in football — it was just the nature of the game. Players were expected to get back up, shake it off, and keep playing. However, the discovery of the link between repeated football head injuries and chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) in the brains of former professional football players by doctors Bennet I. Omalu and Julian Bailes in 2002 led to more research and awareness of the long-term dangers of concussions. 
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