Reference no: EM133607727

Question: Provide a four paragraph summary for the article below. Current Issue: Head Trauma in Young Athletes Late in the first half of a middle school football game in 2006, Zackery Lystedt went down hard and banged his head against the ground. He struggled to his feet holding his head in pain. In the second half, he returned to the game, forcing a fumble by the opposing team on the goal line and preserving the victory for his team. But in the process, he banged his head again. After the game, he said to his father, "Dad, my head hurts," and then "I can't see." Then Zackery lapsed into a coma. A Single Blow to the Head Can Cause a Concussion Zackery most likely suffered a mild concussion after the first impact. A concussion is a trauma-induced change in mental status, often accompanied by headache, confusion, dizziness, double vision, lack of coordination, confused speech, and (occasionally) loss of consciousness. Concussion is a description of symptoms. The medical term for the underlying cause is mild traumatic brain injury (MTBI). The brain is actually a fairly soft and fragile tissue, which is precisely why it is encased in a bony skull for protection. A strong blow to the head jars the brain against the inside of the hard skull, causing temporary disruption of function of higher brain centers (a concussion), followed by mild brain swelling. In most cases, the swelling and the concussive symptoms go away with time, and the person recovers completely. Zackery Lystedt in physical therapy after his accident. Zackery might have recovered from the first impact, except that he suffered a second impact soon after the first. That set the stage for a more serious condition known as second impact syndrome, in which the brain swelling is more severe. Zackery experienced the most extreme condition of all, an acute intracranial hemorrhage. He was in a coma for 30 days, didn't speak for nearly nine months, and even today can only walk short distances with a cane. In response to his sports-related head trauma, in 2009, Zackery's home state of Washington passed one of the toughest laws in the country at the time for protecting young athletes from brain injuries. Under Washington law, athletes under the age of 18 who are suspected of having sustained a concussion must be removed from the game (or practice) and are not allowed to return until they have written authorization-to-play from a medical professional trained to diagnose and manage head injuries. Other states quickly followed suit, and by 2014, all 50 states had passed what have become known as Lystedt Laws. Concussions and other acute brain injuries are more common among young athletes than you might think. Approximately one in five high school football players suffer a concussion or a more serious brain injury in just four years. The second most dangerous high school sport in terms of head injuries is girls soccer. It used to be thought that younger athletes bounced back quickly from"getting their bell rung" (a blow to the head), but neuroscientists now have evidence that it's just the opposite. The effects of acute concussions are longer lasting in adolescents than in adults, and the cognitive deficits are more severe. Fortunately, increased awareness is leading to improvements in safety in contact sports, including better helmets, changes in game rules, increased parental and coach staff awareness of the symptoms of a concussion, and more medical supervision. The Long-Term Effects of Repetitive Head Trauma Until recently, the potential long-term risks of repetitive head trauma were completely unknown. New evidence raises the possibility that athletes who compete in sports with high rates of head impact may be at risk for permanent degenerative brain disease later in life, even if they never suffer an obvious concussion. Medical doctors call it chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), permanent pathological changes in the brain brought about by repeated blows to the head. Impact sensors inside football helmets show that when two professional football linemen collide helmet-to-helmet, the head impact force is the equivalent of hitting your head against the windshield in a car crash at 25 miles per hour. Do these repetitive "minor" impacts have an additive effect? what little information we have so far is cause for concern. In 2007, the National Football League (NFL) commissioned a telephone survey of more than 1,000 retired professional football players who had played at least three seasons in the NFL. The University of Michigan researchers who conducted the survey found that 6.1% of the players over 50 reported that they had been diagnosed with a dementia-related condition, more than five times higher than the national average for their age group. For players aged 30 to 49, it was nineteen times the age-matched national average. (Dementia is the term for the loss of function - including memory, language, judgment, behavior, and thinking -associated with permanent brain damage, as opposed to acute injury.) These and other findings led more than 4,500 former NFL players to sue the league for damages due to concussion-related brain injuries. In 2014, the NFL and the players reached a final agreement in which the league will pay for medical exams, compensate victims of concussion-related brain injuries, and pay for research on how to prevent such injuries in the future. The total cost to the NFL could be more than $870 million over the next 60 years. The highest award that any one player could receive is $5 million. It would be a shame if an inability to protect our athletes from injuries ultimately led to a decline in contact sports. More information is needed about acute and chronic head injuries. We need to know how and why the injuries are occurring and what can be done to prevent them. We owe it to the athletes to make contact sports as safe as possible. Zackery Lystedt graduated from high school in 2011. He is now taking college courses while continuing his rehabilitation.