Dr. Sellman on News Channel 8

News Channel 8 at 3 starts now. We’re learning new evidence tonight and link between severe head injuries and suicide risk. Over two decades, researchers from Canada analyzed patients with concussions. Those with head injuries were at least three times as likely as an average person to commit suicide. The average age of death was 44. Now looking back on the big game yesterday, it’s clear to say the Bronco strong defensive line dominated the field and gave quarterback Cam Newton a run for his money and a lot of hard knocks on the field. But along with those hard knocks for any athlete also comes the risk of CTE, a degenerative brain disease caused by repeated blows to the head. Jen spoke with a local doctor caring for the USF Bulls football team.

That’s right, three letters, C, T. E. chronic traumatic and slow feet and tonight some things that you may not know about this disease and what to do if your child or maybe your husband experiences a hard blow to the skull no matter what sport they play. Dave Mirra, legendary BMX biker may have had CTE before committing suicide. Oakland Raiders, Superbowl winning quarterback, Ken Stabler was diagnosed with CTE as a stage three disease after his death. As a matter of fact, it’s been reported to date as many as 90 former NFL players whose brands had been examined by Boston University have had CTE. Soccer, football, lacrosse as well is very common. Um, any kind of a contact sport. Basketball is uh, can be relatively common as well as skiing.

Dr. Jeff Selman is a certified impact consultant and advocate for concussion prevention. Today he’s seeing athletes at the University of Tampa. Ironically, younger athletes, this is the only injury we know of so far that they actually heal at a longer time than older athletes cause their brain is not as developed.

A common misconception. Even if you don’t get knocked out, you can still have a concussion. and then, in fact, an athlete does not have to have symptoms immediately to have a concussion, which is why the athletic trainer on the sideline is so important to have to be able to monitor the symptoms as you get a hit and then watch the athlete and see what their symptoms are. But all concussions do not have to have an actual bruising. It’s just that’s the psych kind of stunning. Somebody with a stun gun, the neurons or the brain cells that actually talk to one another no longer talk and communicate. Right. So what indicates a concussion, you can’t arouse them that they pass out such that you cannot arouse them something. They start having symptoms that get worse. Nausea, vomiting where they cannot stop as well. Recovering from a concussion. Time is the key. I tell my patients for high school, and I tell my athletes here two weeks is the average.

The NFL has released information on the number of concussions this season and the numbers are surprising. There were 271 concussions and pro football this season up 206 from a year ago. That’s an increase. 32% of the information comes from all preseason and regular season games as well as practices. Since the start of training camp, of the 271 concussions in 2015, 234 occurred in games. 37 happened in practice. Some very scary numbers, guys that are research going into that, we’re going to hear more and more about that. All right. Checking the forecast.