Author: Mark Fainaru-Wada
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0770437567
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 457

View

Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The story of how the NFL, over a period of nearly two decades, denied and sought to cover up mounting evidence of the connection between football and brain damage “League of Denial may turn out to be the most influential sports-related book of our time.”—The Boston Globe “Professional football players do not sustain frequent repetitive blows to the brain on a regular basis.” So concluded the National Football League in a December 2005 scientific paper on concussions in America’s most popular sport. That judgment, implausible even to a casual fan, also contradicted the opinion of a growing cadre of neuroscientists who worked in vain to convince the NFL that it was facing a deadly new scourge: a chronic brain disease that was driving an alarming number of players—including some of the all-time greats—to madness. In League of Denial, award-winning ESPN investigative reporters Mark Fainaru-Wada and Steve Fainaru tell the story of a public health crisis that emerged from the playing fields of our twenty-first-century pastime. Everyone knows that football is violent and dangerous. But what the players who built the NFL into a $10 billion industry didn’t know—and what the league sought to shield from them—is that no amount of padding could protect the human brain from the force generated by modern football, that the very essence of the game could be exposing these players to brain damage. In a fast-paced narrative that moves between the NFL trenches, America’s research labs, and the boardrooms where the NFL went to war against science, League of Denial examines how the league used its power and resources to attack independent scientists and elevate its own flawed research—a campaign with echoes of Big Tobacco’s fight to deny the connection between smoking and lung cancer. It chronicles the tragic fates of players like Hall of Fame Pittsburgh Steelers center Mike Webster, who was so disturbed at the time of his death he fantasized about shooting NFL executives, and former San Diego Chargers great Junior Seau, whose diseased brain became the target of an unseemly scientific battle between researchers and the NFL. Based on exclusive interviews, previously undisclosed documents, and private emails, this is the story of what the NFL knew and when it knew it—questions at the heart of a crisis that threatens football, from the highest levels all the way down to Pop Warner.

Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309288037
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 215

View

Book Description
In the past decade, few subjects at the intersection of medicine and sports have generated as much public interest as sports-related concussions - especially among youth. Despite growing awareness of sports-related concussions and campaigns to educate athletes, coaches, physicians, and parents of young athletes about concussion recognition and management, confusion and controversy persist in many areas. Currently, diagnosis is based primarily on the symptoms reported by the individual rather than on objective diagnostic markers, and there is little empirical evidence for the optimal degree and duration of physical rest needed to promote recovery or the best timing and approach for returning to full physical activity. Sports-Related Concussions in Youth: Improving the Science, Changing the Culture reviews the science of sports-related concussions in youth from elementary school through young adulthood, as well as in military personnel and their dependents. This report recommends actions that can be taken by a range of audiences - including research funding agencies, legislatures, state and school superintendents and athletic directors, military organizations, and equipment manufacturers, as well as youth who participate in sports and their parents - to improve what is known about concussions and to reduce their occurrence. Sports-Related Concussions in Youth finds that while some studies provide useful information, much remains unknown about the extent of concussions in youth; how to diagnose, manage, and prevent concussions; and the short- and long-term consequences of concussions as well as repetitive head impacts that do not result in concussion symptoms. The culture of sports negatively influences athletes' self-reporting of concussion symptoms and their adherence to return-to-play guidance. Athletes, their teammates, and, in some cases, coaches and parents may not fully appreciate the health threats posed by concussions. Similarly, military recruits are immersed in a culture that includes devotion to duty and service before self, and the critical nature of concussions may often go unheeded. According to Sports-Related Concussions in Youth, if the youth sports community can adopt the belief that concussions are serious injuries and emphasize care for players with concussions until they are fully recovered, then the culture in which these athletes perform and compete will become much safer. Improving understanding of the extent, causes, effects, and prevention of sports-related concussions is vitally important for the health and well-being of youth athletes. The findings and recommendations in this report set a direction for research to reach this goal.

Author: Travis R. Bell
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1498570577
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 183

View

Book Description
CTE, Media, and the NFL: Framing a Public Health Crisis as a Football Epidemic examines the central role of mediain constructing an entangled relationship between chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) and the National Football League (NFL), challenging a predominately symbiotic sports/media complex. The authors of this book analyze more than a decade of media coverage, along with three prominent films, to unpack how media discourse resurrects CTE, a preventable degenerative brain disease linked to boxing in 1928, and subsequently frames it as a football epidemic dating back to 2005. The authors position CTE as a public health crisis, whereby media coverage of CTE and the NFL’s vigorous reliance on controversial published research by the Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (MTBI) Committee parallels the moral panic of the HIV/AIDS epidemic and Big Tobacco’s manufacturing of doubt through faulty science. This book argues that the continued aspiration and idolization of the NFL, and its lack of accountability for health concerns surrounding brain injuries, highlight the firm grasp of hegemonic masculinity on the ideology of American football - further problematizing media’s glorification of the sport. Scholars of sports media, health communication, and general media studies will find this book particularly useful to discuss longitudinal effects of media framing centered on critical health risks in sport and the challenge of translating accurate scientific knowledge to the public domain.

Author: Christopher Nowinski
Publisher: Chris Nowinski
ISBN: 1597630136
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 209

View

Book Description
From youth football to the NFL, almost no one understands concussions. Children are dying, and NFL players are retiring early and with impairments. Why? The NFL suppresses the true information about head injuries. Nowinski shows how to recognize them, how long to stay out of action, and how to educate teams and players.

Author: Irvin Muchnick
Publisher: ECW Press
ISBN: 1770906517
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 232

View

Book Description
Inside the most controversial issue in sports Traumatic brain injury in football is not incidental, but an inevitable and central aspect of the sport. Starting in high school, through college, and into the NFL, young players face repeated head trauma, and those sustained injuries create lifelong cognitive and functional difficulties. Muchnick's Concussion Inc. blog exposed the decades-long cover-up of scientific research into sports concussions and the ongoing denial to radically reform football in North America. This compilation from Muchnick's no-holds-barred investigative website reveals the complete head injury story as it developed, from the doctor who played fast and loose with the facts about the efficacy of the state-mandated concussion management system for high school football players, to highly touted solutions that are more self-serving cottage industry than of any genuine benefit. Known for extensive reporting on the tragic story of the Chris Benoit murder-suicide, Muchnick turns his investigative analysis to traumatic brain injury and probes deep into the corporate, government, and media corruption that has enabled the $10-billion-a-year National Football League to trigger a public health crisis.

Author: Kevin W. Farmer
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030548759
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 435

View

Book Description
In-season management of (American) football injuries presents a unique set of problems and considerations. Trying to safely return players to play is of great concern from Pop Warner up to the NFL, and managing injuries during the season with the plan of operative repair in the off-season is also a unique concern with these athletes. Management during the season to allow return to play, while minimizing the risks of further injury, is of utmost importance. This unique book will focus on the management of football injuries during the season and on the sidelines. It will focus on both operative and non-operative treatments that allow safe return to play, utilizing not only the latest scientific literature supporting in-season decisions, but also the experiences of the authors, who have spent many years treating these athletes. Divided into sections on orthopedic and medical considerations, the first part is organized anatomically to present the breadth of injury and treatment strategies available, from injuries to the shoulder and elbow, to ACL/MCL/PCL tears and sprains, to tendinopathies and sports hernia, among many other conditions. The second section covers diverse medical topics germane to football, including heat and cardiac issues, traumatic brain injury, mental health and infectious disease considerations, pain management, and the expanding role of platelet-rich plasma (PRP) in non-operative treatment. Presenting the most recent clinical evidence alongside time-tested management techniques, Football Injuries will be a valuable addition to the practices of orthopedic surgeons, sports medicine specialists, sideline medics and athletic trainers, and primary care physicians treating these athletes.

Author: Blessen C. Eapen
Publisher: Elsevier Health Sciences
ISBN: 0323779441
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 594

View

Book Description
The only review book currently available in this complex field, Brain Injury Medicine: Board Review focuses on the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and management of individuals with varying severity levels of brain injury. Focused, high-yield content prepares you for success on exams and in practice, with up-to-date coverage of traumatic brain injury (TBI), stroke, CNS neoplasms, anoxic brain injury, and other brain disorders. This unique review tool is ideal for residents, fellows, and practitioners studying or working in the field and preparing to take the brain injury medicine exam. - Supports self-assessment and review with 200 board-style questions and explanations. - Covers the information you need to know on traumatic brain injury by severity and pattern, neurologic disorders, systemic manifestations, rehabilitation problems and outcomes, and basic science. - Includes questions on patient management including patient evaluation and diagnosis, prognosis/risk factors, and applied science. - Discusses key topics such as neurodegeneration and dementia; proteomic, genetic, and epigenetic biomarkers in TBI; neuromodulation and neuroprosthetics; and assistive technology. - Reviews must-know procedures including acute emergency management and critical care; post-concussion syndrome assessment, management and treatment; diagnostic procedures and electrophysiology; neuroimaging, and brain death criteria. - Ensures efficient, effective review with content written by experts in physical medicine and rehabilitation, neurology, and psychiatry and a format that mirrors the board exam outline.

Author: Carla Killough McClafferty
Publisher: Carolrhoda Books
ISBN: 1467716650
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 100

View

Book Description
When the 1905 football season ended, nineteen players were dead and countless others were critically injured. The public was outraged. The game had reached a make-or-break moment—fourth down and inches. Coaches, players, fans, and even the president of the United States had one last chance: change football or leave the field. Football's defenders managed to move the chains. Rule changes and reforms after 1905 saved the game and cleared the way for it to become America's most popular sport. But they didn't fix everything. Today, football faces a new injury crisis as dire as 1905's. With increased awareness about brain injury, reported concussions are on the rise among football players. But experts fear concussions may only be the tip of the iceberg. The injuries are almost invisible, but the stakes couldn't be higher: the brains of millions of young football players across the country. Award-winning author Carla Killough McClafferty takes readers on a bone-crunching journey from football's origins to the latest research on concussion and traumatic brain injuries in the sport. Fourth Down and Inches features exclusive photography and interviews with scientists, players, and the families of athletes who have literally given everything to the game. It's fourth and inches. Can football save itself again?

Author: Daniel Laskowitz
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 1498766579
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 388

View

Book Description
Traumatic brain injury (TBI) remains a significant source of death and permanent disability, contributing to nearly one-third of all injury related deaths in the United States and exacting a profound personal and economic toll. Despite the increased resources that have recently been brought to bear to improve our understanding of TBI, the developme

Author: Linda Carroll
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1451627459
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 338

View

Book Description
Discusses the current epidemic of sports-related concussions, including true-life stories of victims and the ongoing research to unravel the mysteries of concussions, as well as the crusade to prevent these types of injuries.