College sports can be a real knock out! Literally

     

Concussions becoming more serious and prominent in College Sports.

Concussions have been a very real sports injury for years now, but just recently these past years has society really come to understand and get a grasp on how serious these injuries really are to athletes. College sports are huge part in our society; from the fans to the parents to the athletes themselves. Student athletes put in countless hours of their hard work and determination. With that hard work comes injuries and one of the most popular injuries unfortunately, are concussions.

Some may think that concussions aren’t that relevant and a broken arm or foot would be more likely to happen than a concussion. Think again. The NCAA gave out a poll in 2010 to approximately 20,000 college athletes and in Division I, 11.7 percent of athletes had a concussion. In Division II 12 percent experienced one and in Division III 11.9 percent experienced a concussion.

            As you can see concussions are serious issues in today’s college sports.  Hiram College is a division III School located in Hiram, Ohio. They have sports that range from football to soccer to lacrosse. Even Hiram has been plagued with concussions ranging from many different sports. In specific a player from the Hiram men’s soccer team has been concussed five times in his life, one of his concussions being at Hiram. Luke Wilhelm is currently a sophomore goalkeeper at Hiram College. Wilhelm’s last concussion took him one year and one month to recover from. He was sent to a doctor who works for the Pittsburgh Penguins in Pennsylvania, who specializes in concussions. He was put through a serious of tests before he could be cleared back to play.

Wilhelm explains the symptoms of his last serious concussion, “I was heading the ball off the corner and I hit the side of my head funny, immediately I was sensitive to light and sound and became very nauseous. I also had trouble walking.”

The doctor diagnosed him with two concussions out of the six possible concussions you can receive. He had an ocular concussion, which is the strain on his eyes, and an anxiety based concussion that will bring on a symptom of self-doubt and constant overthinking. Wilhelm was cleared by his doctor and then by trainers at Hiram College. The trainers at Hiram go through a strict protocol that is world wide with all NCAA sports and is followed very strictly. They basically take an athlete’s baseline test, which is when they’re healthy and once they have a concussion they must get tested over and over again until they are back to their baseline.

Wilhelm is currently back on the field cleared and playing in his spring season. However Wilhelm’s one of the lucky ones. Concussions can end some athlete’s careers. One concussion did for head coach of Women’s Soccer, Michael Cracas. “I had several concussions ending my playing career in college.”

Having more than one concussion has scary and real consequences, which is the reason for sports careers ending. With repeated damage to the brain can lead to long term neurologic and functional deficits and sometimes even death. Concussions are a very real and scary think in this day and age and our society is making steps to make sure these injuries are taken care of very thoroughly. You never know if it’s going to happen to you, and if or when it does be careful and smart in recovering.

What to look out for when an athlete gets hit hard in the head and when to look for the signs of a concussion.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tyv4du7BTOc

References

      What have we learned from 500 concussions in 3 years of college football? (n.d.). Retrieved March 24, 2016, from http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/america-tonight/articles/2015/12/30/500-concussions-ncaa-college-football-reporting.html

      N. (2014, February). Self-Reported Concussion among NCAA Student-Athletes Executive Summary [Scholarly project]. In NCAA.org. Retrieved March 24, 2016, from https://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/Concussion GOALS Exec Summary_Feb_12_2014_FINALpost_0.pdf

      Concussion guidelines. (2014). Retrieved March 24, 2016, from http://www.ncaa.org/health-and-safety/concussion-guidelines