Listening to NPR on the way home Friday, concerning brain injuries among athletes. This is one of those issues that drives me nuts. Rattle a brain, give it a chance to heal. It's not THAT hard. For stupid sports. Ok, so there is a ton of money involved as well. Just like the massive cost of treating vets for their brain injuries. This really isn't that complicated. Let brains heal when they have been so impacted that they don't work properly for any moment of time. Put lives ahead of short careers.
There is a particular cry with a fresh head injury. I heard it in patients when in nursing school clinicals. Maybe it struck a nerve, because I remembered it from when I lost consciousness as a child around hitting my head on the fulcrum of a teeter-totter with my brothers and cousins on either side. To this day, I'm convinced it is why I have migraines. And I remember, viscerally, how I cried after. Soul deep, marrow deep, gut sobs, as voices told me I would have a "goose egg." They seemed echoed in the young man in the unit with the head bang, but with a history of narcotic addiction and so no drugs for him. One of those moments that will stay with me all my life. And the definition has loosened, not just lack of consciousness, but seeing stars, or other cognitive symptoms after a hit to the head.
None of this is new. But those with the money and power to insist on a standard of care prefer not to bother. Are they ever going to look like self serving idiots.
I sometimes wonder how much this damage still affects me.
5 comments:
They have been talking lately about studies that have shown increased incidences of ALS among athletes who get concussed, or are close to concussed often, like football players.
I have never had my head rattled in any way that comes close to being described as a concussion, fortunately.
Though, since my grandfather died of ALS, there is a 10% chance I'll die the same way.
word verification: disest
Curious how sometimes the word verification is somehow related to the topic of the post or reply.
Phil,
My understanding is that ALS and post traumatic brain injury are separate diseases with similar symptoms. Lou Gehrig probably had the latter, not the disease named after him.
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2011489,00.html
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