Chris Henry had a progressive generative disease at time of death

No. He was labeled a problem child before he got to WVU. And lived up to expectations while in Morgantown.

 

Exactly. You actually can't formally diagnose Alzheimer's until after someone dies. You can get to a diagnosis by process of elimination, as in you don't have this, this or this, so logic suggests you have this. But you can't diagnose it, because you can't see the damage that is or isn't there.

But you can't do that kind of study on the brain unless you can, as my stepdad used to say, take it out and play with it.

 

I would be equally concerned with a youngster playing soccer. Maybe this is why Maradona is nuts:

Heading for trouble
A study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) has raised new concerns about the practice of "heading" a soccer ball. A group of 33 young adult amateur soccer players in the Netherlands submitted to more than a dozen tests designed to measure various brain functions. The results were compared to those of a control group of runners and swimmers. The findings:

* 39% of the soccer players had an impaired performance on tests measuring planning abilities, compared with 13% of the control athletes.

* 27% of the soccer players, compared with 7% of the control athletes, had an impaired performance on memory tests.

* Concussions were frequent; 27% had one concussion due to soccer play; 23% had two to five concussions over the course of their years playing the sport.

The conclusions:

"Participation in amateur soccer is associated with decreased performance on tests of memory and planning. Although cognitive impairment appears to be mild, it presents a medical and public health concern... Methods for surveillance and prevention should be developed and adopted to maximize safety."

What's the impact?
Dr. Lyle Micheli, director of the division of sports medicine at Children's Hospital in Boston, advises parents of young soccer players to take the findings "seriously," noting that despite the small sample size used in the study, its findings concur with the results of earlier research.

"It's an additional piece of data that suggests there's a problem here," says Micheli, one of the nation's leading medical authorities on youth sports. "I would not encourage a child under 12 to head the ball. I think that would be a responsible guideline for now (pending further research.)"

Dr. Robert Michaels, a pediatrician, agrees. "Never mind the head itself, small children just don't have the neck strength to do heading and there's the risk of injury there. But I wouldn't take my kids out of soccer based on this study."

 

Not sure where to post this, but maybe some more evidence that this is more prevalent among foorball players than previously believed:

 

I read this and can't help but wonder why, and how, Stewart Bradley was allowed to continue playing in the first half of yesterday's Eagles game.

 

Because somebody, or multiple somebodies, on the Eagles' sideline fucked up royally. Somebody should be fired for it. Seriously.

 

The one thing I saw on the Bradley situation was that the Eagles' doctors were examining Kolb for his concussion at the time and hadn't examined Bradley.

It's possible he went back in on his own without being cleared to go back in. Some assistant trainer should have had his helmet and made sure he didn't get it back.

 

I read elsewhere that he passed some test on the sideline first. Perhaps that information was wrong. There is no excuse for him getting back on the field that day. He had a concussion. He couldn't even walk off the field on his own. I'll say it again. Whoever was in charge of him should be fired for letting him get back onto the field. If nobody was in charge, then either the trainer, the head coach or both should be fired. And yes, I'm serious, even though I know it isn't realistic.

 

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10262/1088731-114.stm

Mainbar of a package on concussions, focusing on the youth level. Includes one story of parents begging a doctor to let a 7-year-old boy with a concussion return after halftime of the game in which he was injured. Fucking idiots.

 

It should be that once you sustain a concussion, you're not allowed to re-enter the game. If the teams are unwilling to follow that, then the league has to step in.

 

This is the NFL policy. It is interesting to read the comments of the representatives from the NFL committee assigned to deal with concussion and head injury who believe that the Eagle medical and training staff followed appropriate procedure to allow Bradley to return to the game. Replay proves them wrong.

Once again, if replay can be used to decide whether a foot lands in bounds or if a receiver caught a ball, it should be used to watch players stagger on the fielsd after a hit.

 

This just shows the league is putting up a front rather than really taking the issue seriously. The league office can bother to rule that the Jets acted inappropriately with that idiot reporter, but they take no action at all against the Eagles for blatantly disregarding the rules and endangering the health of one of their players? Fucking pathetic.