You might’ve had one in the past, especially if you’ve played a sport before. I have never, fortunately, therefore I don’t have any experience on what you feel when you get a concussion. In the US per year, players of sports and recreational activities receive between 2.5 million and 4 million concussions. Each person can experience a concussion differently and it all depends on how the brain responds when something strikes it.
The brain’s tissue is made of a vast network of 90 billion neurons, which relays signals through long axons. These axons have a spindly structure and that makes them very fragile where they can stretch and tear quite easily. As these destroyed axons begin to degenerate, they also release toxins causing the death of other neurons. All this is what causes a concussion.
Some effects of a concussion include blackout, headache, blurry vision, balance problems, altered mood and behavior, and many more. Sometimes, people who get concussions can experience post-concussion syndrome, or PCS. These people may experience constant headaches, learning difficulties, and behavioral symptoms that can be in effect for months or years after the injury.
People sometimes just continue their lives normally without fully healing their previous concussion, which will later most likely cause even more damage. An overload of sub concussive hits can lead to Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, or CTE. People who suffer from this can experience changes in their mood and behavior that begin appearing in their 30s or 40s and can even lead to memory loss which may result in dementia.
With all this, some people might want to be extremely careful about hits to the head. But it isn’t always easy to just give yourself time to heal, especially if you are doing some type of sport. 50% and 80% of concussions go unreported and untreated. All these hits can be dangerous for not only your present-self, but your future-self.
Word Count: 317
Concussions are very dangerous, I do play football but I have never received a major concussion. I know I have definitely had some small ones but they were all manageable. I will always urge a teammate to go to the doctor when something happens but they often don’t listen.
ReplyDelete