Traumatic Head Injuries in Sports

Head injuries are relatively common in football, accounting for up to 22% of all injuries in the sport(1). A significant fraction of these injuries are concussions, which are states of neural dysfunction resulting from head trauma in which there is the possibility of auditory abnormalities may also be observed as part of the concussive state. Concussions in football players have been linked with drop-offs in their cognitive functioning. For example, in a study carried out at Erasmus University in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in which 84 active professional players from several premier-league football clubs were evaluated, the frequency of football-related concussions was linked with poorer results on tests measuring sustained attention and visuoperceptual processing(2). In addition, a classic study carried out with 69 active football players and 37 former members of the Norwegian national football team determined that 30% of the former players complained of permanent problems such as headache, dizziness, irritability, neck pain, and impaired memory(1). In addition, 35% of the active players and 32% of the former players displayed abnormal EEGs, compared with about 12% of matched control individuals. When the former players were subjected to cerebral computed tomography (CT) and a neuropsychological examination, a full one-third of the athletes were found to have central cerebral