Luke Dunstan and Concussion

[White Winmar]

Hi WW and Rippluger66,
I've got an interest in this area as I coach junior footy and am also a trainer and a doctor.
The evidence is that helmets may prevent local trauma - I.e. a cut/laceration/fracture - but they don't stop concussion. This is because the injury in concussion is caused by the brain, which sort of floats in fluid, sloshing back and forth rapidly and forcefully inside the skull and getting bruised up. Wearing a helmet doesn't stop this internal movement from happening.
There is evidence that wearing helmets makes players feel protected and they put themselves at greater risk as they think they don't have to worry about it and go in harder with their heads.
There's lots of money to be made if someone could invent a concussion-preventing helmet but they don't exist at present.
Here are some reputable links:
http://sma.org.au/2013/11/helmets-do-no ... oncussion/ - from sports medicine Australia
http://www.aflcommunityclub.com.au/index.php?id=883 - from the AFL
There is also this from the US - http://www.sportsafetyinternational.org ... met-study/
And this from Australasian science - http://www.australasianscience.com.au/a ... dache.html
The post-concussion management is really important but helmets, unfortunately, don't prevent it.
There's lots of research though and maybe there will be a helmet that does work in the near future - as I noted, there's lots of money to be made by the person who comes up with this...
TFD

Thanks for that TFD. I know there's research around supporting the notion that helmets don't prevent concussion entirely. I concede that no matter what protection you have, as you rightly point out, concussion is caused by impact and the brain being moved around and contacting the skull, or by rapid deceleration. I too, have a professional interest in brain injury, and unfortunately I've seen the devastating effects of it.

My point is, that while you can't entirely eradicate concussion, you can minimise its severity and impact. It's the same argument that's used in all harm minimisation strategies. Injuries are a part of any sport, particularly those involving contact. Just as we apply strapping and padding to ourselves to protect and support limbs and joints, why can't we provide the same for our most precious and important organ, the brain?

As for designing a better helmet, that is the point of the research I quoted. No one is claiming the new helmet could prevent concussion. You can't. But it dramatically reduced the impact of injury, in some cases by up to 85%! Surely that might be worth looking into. I have looked at pictures of the helmet used in the study and it seemed the internal padding was greater in depth, different in density and had different patterns to the traditional style. So it seems that someone is already designing a better helmet, and yes, if it continues to show promise, then its designers will become very wealthy indeed. The main concern, though, must be the health and wellbeing of sporting participants.

[Bluthy]

Shows how brutal it is in the heat of the kitchen. To be a second year player who along with Armo are our only true inside ball winning players with very little support speaks volumes. He's exhausting himself in there against the huge bodied mids and then people expect him to tear it up around the ground as well already Let him get a few seasons under his belt with a decent tank and Dunny will be a ripper.

[Johnny Member]

Haven't about 4 guys recently retired prematurely due to too many head knocks?


Clearly the doctors didn't have these guys covered.