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110 N.F.L. Brains

nytimes.com

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Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#121

Post by tedunangst »

nerfhammer wrote: post #72
Touche wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the reply. This is what I'm trying to understand myself. I didn't see the 9% number in the article. I did see the mention about selection bias. So I wonder what the true numbers are here. If it's 9% then that explains well enough why so many ex-players don't show strong signs of CTE (by strong I mean long-term memory loss or worse).

The 9% is assuming that 100% of unknown cases are in fact negative. This study showed that 110 of 111 players tested had CTE. But many of their families consented because they suspected CTE already, so it's not a random sample and therefore you can't generalize that to the rest of the population. 110 is 9% of the population of 1300 deceased players for the given time period. CTE is normally extremely rare.

Why is the total population deceased players and not all players?

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#122

Post by endorphone »

ericd wrote: post #100
nicpottier wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about GP, but I'm an aggressive skier and very, very rarely hit my head. I have maybe a dozen falls a season, wear a helmet and am not colliding with anything. This is a silly comparison.

Maybe the aggressive compressions of slalom cause the brain to bounce around a bit? In any case, I'm sure it's much less than the sudden stops caused by running into a 300 pound lineman.

The Earth weighs a good deal more than a 300lb lineman, and it's the Earth that skiiers are repeatedly running into while carrying an enormous amount of inertia.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#123

Post by grillvogel »

mikeh1010 wrote: post #12

I want to push back on the "every sport is dangerous" argument I'm seeing in here. There's a difference between "you might die right in the middle of this very fun activity" and "you might die slowly and horribly years from now when you're retired and in the midst of raising a family." I ski pretty aggressively, and of course I might die doing that. But every day I go home and know, "well it wasn't today! Today was j…

>"but today might give me a mental disorder in 20 years" then I'd be much less inclined to participate in the sport.

what if you were paid millions of dollars to do it and treated as a living god? i think a lot of people would still take that deal even knowing the risks.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#124

Post by mustacheemperor »

saulrh wrote: post #40
ggreer wrote: post #37

Playing football is almost certainly bad for your brain, but this article does a terrible job of making that case. The doctor in charge of the study says as much: > The set of players posthumously tested by Dr. McKee is far from a random sample of N.F.L. retirees. “There’s a tremendous selection bias,” she has cautioned, noting that many families have donated brains specifically because the former player showed sympt…

9% chance, the best possible case given the current data, of a horrible, slow, lingering death 20 years later is still unacceptable . What's the rate for getting mesothelioma after working with asbestos?

With that percentage - which is considered the unlikely minimum - there is at least one player developing CTE on the field for every team in the league right now.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#125

Post by soundwave106 »

Goladus wrote: post #59
saulrh wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

9% chance, the best possible case given the current data, of a horrible, slow, lingering death 20 years later is still unacceptable . What's the rate for getting mesothelioma after working with asbestos?

Unacceptable to whom? Is the US a free country or not?

Parents, perhaps?

I've seen plenty of articles headlined with something along the line of "should my kid play football?" If you knew your kid would have a 10% chance of developing CTE by playing the sport... well, I would think many parents would pause and reconsider. Certainly I would.

It's still a free country. Football is nowhere near the state of being "banned" or anything close to that. Plenty of other sports with probable worse concussion issues are also popular (see: MMA)

American football's huge prominence merely puts a bigger spotlight on this issue. In my opinion, the most likely outcome is equipment and/or rules changes. American football has changed rules and/or mandated equipment in the name of safety before.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#126

Post by steanne »

tedunangst wrote: post #121
nerfhammer wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 9% is assuming that 100% of unknown cases are in fact negative. This study showed that 110 of 111 players tested had CTE. But many of their families consented because they suspected CTE already, so it's not a random sample and therefore you can't generalize that to the rest of the population. 110 is 9% of the population of 1300 deceased players for the given time period. CTE is normally extremely rare.

Why is the total population deceased players and not all players?

because you can't test the living ones

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#127

Post by tnecniv »

FanaHOVA wrote: post #36
hervature wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the prevalence of concussions in football compared to rugby is proof that "better equipment" doesn't prevent concussions. It has the paradoxical effect of causing them. Better shoulder pads allow for people to launch their bodies without fear of separating their shoulders. Conversely, helmets are not designed to protect the brain, only to prevent skull fractures. Thus, I don't think your argument holds water.

You are right about the equipment (even though obviously only concussion vs concussion + skull fracture is a step forward!), but the difference between football and rugby goes way beyond the equipment. In the former there's no lateral passing, which means that the ball carrier will always be a target for the whole defense. In rugby you can pass the ball, which makes the defense spread wider and doesn't allow them to…

Football does have lateral passing, but yes, tactically it is much rarer.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#128

Post by waynecochran »

pcl wrote: post #70

I don't really know what a normal brain looks like. A sidebar (middlebar?) about halfway through the article describes what we're looking at: The trauma of repetitive blows to the head triggers degeneration in brain tissue, including the buildup of an abnormal protein called tau. Thin slices of tissue are dyed and the tau shows up as these darker areas.

Yes. The site needs to show a normal brain. I don't have anything to compare to. Really bad omission.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#129

Post by tnecniv »

lobf wrote: post #64
danso wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar to how boxing gloves don't protect the punched as much as it allows the puncher to go full throttle without fear of breaking their hands: https://www.economist.com/news/international/21639765-bare-k...

Same with headgear- it's there to prevent cuts, not to cushion blows, but some people feel safer wearing headgear to spar in boxing. In my experience it makes my head a larger target than I'm used to, plus it affects my peripheral vision, making me take more shots to the head than I would have otherwise. Plus, put on some headgear, let me punch you, and tell me how cushioned you felt.

Won't the headgear just make your head a larger target to glancing blows, not the big direct hits?

Also, the worst part of the headgear, in my opinion, is I find it way harder to breath when it's on and I can confirm that I've felt punch drunk up to an hour or two after catching a bad direct hit while sparing with headgear.

Re: 110 N.F.L. Brains

#130

Post by matwood »

ggreer wrote: post #37

Playing football is almost certainly bad for your brain, but this article does a terrible job of making that case. The doctor in charge of the study says as much: > The set of players posthumously tested by Dr. McKee is far from a random sample of N.F.L. retirees. “There’s a tremendous selection bias,” she has cautioned, noting that many families have donated brains specifically because the former player showed sympt…

> Playing football is almost certainly bad for your brain

It's bad for you in general. I used to go a gym with some ex-NFL guys, and they literally could barely move most days. All of them told me they would never let their kids play football. Every single one had life long lasting ailments, and none of them were the guys who made millions.

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