Wisconsin governor Scott Walker signed youth concussion legislation into law today at Lambeau Field in Green Bay. Support for the bill came from physicians, student-athletes, the NFL's Green Bay Packers and other organizations. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has exhibited an unwavering committment to the adoption of concussion legislation nationwide, starting with the Washington state concussion law named after middle school football player Zackery Lystedt, who was injured during a game in 2006. Like the Lystedt Law, Wisconsin's concussion law calls for the removal of any athlete suspected of having suffered a concussion and requires a player to obtain written medical authorization before resuming activity. The new law also requires the state Department of Public Instruction to work in conjunction with the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association to develop guidelines and education standards for parents, coaches, and athletes. Source: Walker signing bills legalizing wolf hunt, cracking down on youth concussions -- Star Tribune --April 2, 2012 Questions/comments? Contact Jean Rickerson at Jean@SportsConcussions.org

MUNCIE, Ind. -- Student-athletes will receive financial assistance to help defray the costs of baseline testing from a fund named for the late Chicago Bears' Dave Duerson who committed suicide a year ago. An autopsy revealed Duerson suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a degenerative brain disease. CTE is associated with repetitive head trauma and can affect judgement, mood, impulse control and memory. Computerized neuropsychological concussion tests, known as "baseline" tests, are typically taken by student-athletes prior to the beginning of their sports season on a computer at home, in a school computer lab or in a doctor's office. Structured similar to a computer game, a student-athlete will complete various online exercises that measure memory, reaction times and cognitive processing speeds. If an injury occurs the test is retaken and baseline scores are compared to post-injury values. The difference between the two can give trained medical professionals a look at potential issues that need further evaluation prior to clearing a student-athlete to return to activity. "The baseline testing gives everyone a free opportunity to pre-test," Central High School football coach John Hochstetler said. "The post-test comes with a fee, and that's where some of our youngsters run into challenges," according to The Star Press. The Dave Duerson Muncie Community Schools Athletic Safety Fund will assist injured athletes who can't afford the post-injury test at two middle schools and two high schools beginning with the 2012-2013 season. Duerson played football, basketball and baseball at Northside High School in Muncie, Ind. He went on to play for Notre Dame where he received All-American recognition in 1981 and 1982 before entering the NFL. Duerson played for the Chicago Bears, New York Giants, and the Arizona Cardinals. He earned two Super Bowl championship rings and was selected to four consecutive Pro Bowls from 1986-1989 during his eleven-year career in the NFL. Duerson was the NFL 'Man of the Year' in 1987. Source: Duerson fund will assist Muncie athletes -- The Star Press April 1, 2012 Questions/comments? contact Jean Rickerson at Jean@SportsConcussions.org

Pop Warner, the nation's largest youth football organization announced Tuesday it is taking steps to eliminate hits to the head and reduce the number of concussions suffered by players. Chairman of the Pop Warner medical advisory board, Dr. Julian Bailes said, "The impact of head-to-head contact causes the most severe concussions, so we felt it was imperative that Pop Warner take a proactive approach and limit contact in practices. We're trying to take away all at once the head-to-head contact in practice." Pop Warner is the nation's oldest and largest youth football, cheerleading and dance program, with over 400,000 members ranging in age from 5-14. Starting in August many teams practice nine hours a week until Labor Day when most are then shortened to six hours. Research has shown that some of the hardest hits and many concussions occur during practice, not games. New rules prohibit head-to-head hits and limit contact in practices to 40 minutes a day. Full-speed head-on blocking and tackling drills where players line up more than three feet apart are no longer allowed. In April 2012, veteran journalist and former Dateline co-anchor, Stone Phillips produced a report entitled, "Hard Hits, Hard Numbers," detailing a Virginia Tech study on head impacts in youth football. Accelerometers placed inside 7- and 8-year-old players' helmets recorded hits from 15g-100g, surprising researchers. Previously, many believed that players that age did not have the speed or strength to deliver hits of those magnitudes. Over 4 million sports- and recreation-related concussions occur each year in the United States and more than half of those are suffered as a result of football, reported NBC News. Source: Ahead of Season, Pop Warner renews safety emphasis -- USA Today -- June 12, 2012Pop Warner limits contact in practice --boston.com -- June 12, 2012Pop Warner issues new safety regulations -- NBC News --June 12, 2012Questions/comments? contact Jean Rickerson at jean@SportsConcussions.org Source: Pop Warner limits contact in practice -- Boston.com -- June 12,2012 Pop Warner issues new safety regulations -- NBC News --June 12, 2012 Questions/comments? contact jean@SportsConcussions.org

Bronx, NY — Patients vary widely in their response to concussion, but scientists haven’t understood why. Now, using a new technique for analyzing data from brain imaging studies, researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University andMontefiore Medical Center have found that concussion victims have unique spatial patterns of brain abnormalities that change over time. The new technique could eventually help in assessing concussion patients, predicting which head injuries are likely to have long-lasting neurological consequences, and evaluating the effectiveness of treatments, according to lead author Michael L. Lipton, M.D., Ph.D., associate director of the Gruss Magnetic Resonance Research Center at Einstein and medical director of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) services at Montefiore. The findings are published today in the online edition of Brain Imaging and Behavior. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that more than one million Americans sustain a concussion (also known as mild traumatic brain injury, or mTBI) each year. Concussions in adults result mainly from motor vehicle accidents or falls. At least 300,000 adults and children are affected by sports-related concussions each year. While most people recover from concussions with no lasting ill effects, as many as 30 percent suffer permanent impairment – undergoing a personality change or being unable to plan an event. A 2003 federal study called concussions “a serious public health problem” that costs the U.S. an estimated $80 billion a year. Previous imaging studies found differences between the brains of people who have suffered concussions and normal individuals. But those studies couldn’t assess whether concussion victims differ from one another. “In fact, most researchers have assumed that all people with concussions have abnormalities in the same brain regions,” said Dr. Lipton, who is also associate professor of radiology, ofpsychiatry and behavioral sciences, and in the Dominick P. Purpura Department of Neuroscience at Einstein. “But that doesn’t make sense, since it is more likely that different areas would be affected in each person because of differences in anatomy, vulnerability to injury and mechanism of injury.” In the current study, the Einstein researchers used a recently developed MRI technique called diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) on 34 consecutive patients (19 women and 15 men aged 19 to 64) diagnosed with mTBI at Montefiore in the Bronx and on 30 healthy controls. The patients were imaged within two weeks of injury and again three and six months afterward. The imaging data were then analyzed using a new software tool called Enhanced Z-score Microstructural Assessment Pathology (EZ-MAP), which allows researchers for the first time to examine microstructural abnormalities across the entire brain of individual patients. EZ-MAP was developed by Dr. Lipton and his colleagues at Einstein. DTI detects subtle damage to the brain by measuring the direction of diffusion of water in white matter. The same technology was used by Dr. Lipton and his team in widely publicized research on more than 30 amateur soccer players who had all played the sport since childhood. They found that frequent headers showed brain injury similar to that seen in patients with concussion. The uniformity of diffusion direction – an indicator of whether tissue has maintained its microstructural integrity – is measured on a zero-to-one scale called fractional anisotropy (FA). In the latest study, areas of abnormally low FA (reflecting abnormal brain regions) were observed in concussion patients but not in controls. Each concussion patient had a unique spatial pattern of low FA that evolved over the study period. Surprisingly, each patient also had a unique, evolving pattern of abnormally high FA distinct from the areas of low FA. “We found widespread high FA at every time point, all the way out to six months and even in patients more than one year out from their injury.” said Dr. Lipton. “We suspect that high FA represents a response to the injury. In other words, the brain may be trying to compensate for the injury by developing and enhancing other neural connections. This is a new and unexpected finding.” At present, diagnosis of concussions is based mainly on the nature of the patient’s accident and the presence of symptoms including headache, dizziness and behavioral abnormalities. DTI, combined with EZ-MAP analysis, might offer a more objective tool for diagnosing concussion injuries and for predicting which patients will have persistent and progressive symptoms. The paper is titled “Robust Detection of Traumatic Axonal Injury in Individual Mild Traumatic Brain Injury Patients: Intersubject Variation, Change Over Time and Bidirectional Changes in Anisotropy.” Contributors include Namhee Kim, Ph.D.; Tova M. Gardin, B.A.; Keivan Shifteh, M.D.; Mimi Kim, Sc.D.; Molly E. Zimmerman, Ph.D.; Richard B. Lipton, M.D.; and Craig A. Branch, Ph.D., all of Einstein and Montefiore; and Young Park, M.D., who earned his degree from Einstein; and Miriam Hulkower, a medical student at Einstein. Source: Novel Brain Imaging Technique Explains Why Concussions Affect People Differently Albert Einstein College of Medicine at Yeshiva University -- Newswise; June 9, 2012 Questions/comments? contact Jean Rickerson at jean@SportsConcussions.org

Collisions. Headers. Goalpost run-ins. Soccer athletes and fans can't help but wonder which elements contribute most to the frequency of concussions in the sport, particularly among young girls. Researchers have been collecting data in helmeted sports for many years using accelerometers embedded in head gear, but non-helmeted sports have presented obvious challenges. Impact data has provided some of the most critical science in the concussion field. As a result, the forces that players sustain in various contact sports are well-documented and found, in some cases, to be alarming. The latest addition to the data bank was the inclusion of an impact study on 7-and 8-year-old football players and the adult-sized forces they incurred during practices. Now the focus is turning to other sports, including soccer. A new study by researchers at Wayne State University, published in the Journal of the American College of Sports Medicine offers insight into head acceleration in girls' youth soccer (U14) during game play. HITS The Head Impact Telemetry System (HITS) used to measure the force impacts, was utilized in this study. Small accelerometers typically mounted inside helmets, transmit data wirelessly to researchers on the sideline. In this case, soccer headbands with the padding removed were outfitted with the instrumentation. Impacts over 10g, or 10x the force of gravity, were recorded and analyzed at a later time alongside corresponding video footage to determine the nature of the hit. For reference, a sneeze might be 3g, a fighter pilot might "pull" 9g during maneuvers, and high school football players regularly sustain hits ranging from 60-100g and higher, many without reporting concussion symptoms. A total of 24 girls participated in the study, conducted during scrimmages on grass fields. Scrimmages lasted 30 to 65 minutes each. None of the players suffered a concussion during the research. Results There were 47 header impacts and 20 non-header impacts observed during the study. Non-header impacts included collisions with another player, player falls, collisions with goalposts, and unintended collisions with the ball. Researchers found: - majority of non-header impacts (40%) were player-to-player collisions - most headers impacted the front of the head; the peak linear acceleration (force) recorded was 4.5g- greatest header force occurred on the right side of the head and was measured at 62.9g - most head impacts players sustained in one scrimmage was four - side headers resulted in greater forces than back headers - player collisions resulted in the highest number of nonheader impacts and had a maximum force of 56.7g - impacts from player falls measured a maximum force of 23.7g - a goalpost collision measured a maximum of 27.1g Researchers hypothesized that non-header impacts would exceed those from heading the ball, but that was not what the case. Many of the players experienced multiple impacts in a single scrimmage, the cumulative effects of such impacts within a short time frame are unknown. Conclusions Concussions can occur in any sport and amending equipment and making rule changes to decrease the frequency and severity of the injury depends on science. Soccer has emerged as the leading cause of sport-related concussions for young girls and researchers are working to unravel the reasons why. Hypotheses range from less neck strength, to hormonal differences to better reporting by females. Source: Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise: June 2012 - Volume 44 - Issue 6 - p 1102–1108 doi: 10.1249/MSS.0b013e3182444d7d Applied Sciences Questions/comments? contact Jean Rickerson at jean@SportsConcussions.org

MINNEAPOLIS – A new study suggests that head impacts experienced during contact sports such as football and hockey may worsen some college athletes’ ability to acquire new information. The research is published in the May 16, 2012, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. The study involved college athletes at three Division I schools and compared 214 athletes in contact sports to 45 athletes in non-contact sports such as track, crew and Nordic skiing at the beginning and at the end of their seasons. The contact sport athletes wore special helmets that recorded the acceleration speed and other data at the time of any head impact. The contact sport athletes experienced an average of 469 head impacts during the season. Athletes were not included in the study if they were diagnosed with a concussion during the season. All of the athletes took tests of thinking and memory skills before and after the season. A total of 45 contact sport athletes and 55 non-contact sport athletes from one of the schools also took an additional set of tests of concentration, working memory and other skills. “The good news is that overall there were few differences in the test results between the athletes in contact sports and the athletes in non-contact sports,” said study author Thomas W. McAllister, MD, of The Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth in Lebanon, N.H. “But we did find that a higher percentage of the contact sport athletes had lower scores than would have been predicted after the season on a measure of new learning than the non-contact sport athletes.” A total of 22 percent of the contact sport athletes performed worse than expected on the test of new learning, compared to four percent of the non-contact sport athletes. McAllister noted that the study did not find differences in test results between the two groups of athletes at the beginning of the season, suggesting that the cumulative head impacts that contact athletes had incurred over many previous seasons did not result in reduced thinking and memory skills in the overall group. “These results are somewhat reassuring, given the recent heightened concern about the potential negative effects of these sports,” he said. “Nevertheless, the findings do suggest that repetitive head impacts may have a negative effect on some athletes.” McAllister said it’s possible that some people may be genetically more sensitive to head impacts. The study was supported by the National Institutes of Health and the National Operating Committee on Standards for Athletic Equipment. Source: American Academy of Neurology -- May 16, 2012 Questions/comments? contact Jean Rickerson at Jean@SportsConcussions.org Photo courtesy of JamieLWilliams (c)2006 CreativeCommons.com

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- The National Operating Committee on Standards for Athletic Equipment (NOCSAE) issued a warning to athletes and parents of athletes to thoroughly understand the extent of protection provided by – or not provided by – athletic equipment worn while playing sports. This warning follows claims made by several companies that products such as head bands, supplements or mouth guards reduce the incident of concussion. NOCSAE issued the warning at the onset of its summer meeting held this year in Kansas City. NOCSAE is an independent organization with the dual purpose of setting standards for the performance of athletic equipment and funding research necessary to advance the science of sports. Through NOCSAE's independent process, physicians, academic researchers, coaches, trainers and manufacturers come together to establish standards based on accepted science and reliable data. "Parents, athletes and coaches are becoming more informed about concussions, and this increased awareness is vitally important to advancing athlete safety. But it also creates a demand for quick solutions. Unfortunately there are quick solutions offered for sale which have neither scientific nor medical support that validate their claims to prevent or reduce concussions," said Mike Oliver, NOCSAE executive director. "Any device or supplement promoted as being able to prevent, diagnose or cure a concussion must be supported by scientific data and peer-reviewed research. Currently there is no definitive scientific research linking mouth guards, head bands, supplements or other specialty products to a reduction in concussion risk or severity. For companies to suggest otherwise misleads athletes, parents and coaches into a dangerous false sense of protection against concussion. NOCSAE warns athletes and parents of athletes to get the facts about sports equipment and concussion protection and not rely solely on marketing and promotional materials when making equipment decisions." NOCSAE does not maintain any standards for such products, and, therefore, no such products can be claimed as meeting the NOCSAE standards. While protective equipment certified to the NOCSAE standard play an incredibly important role in protecting athletes on the field of play, they should be not the primary approach to protecting against concussion. Learning to avoid unnecessary head impacts, reporting concussion symptoms to a coach or parent and following trained medical management decisions about when a concussed athlete can return to play are far more likely to prevent a concussion or reduce the chance of chronic problems that may be related to untreated concussions. For more information, please visit www.nocsae.org. About NOCSAE NOCSAE, the Nhttps:// Operating Committee on Standards for Athletic Equipment, is an independent and nonprofit standard-setting body with the sole mission to enhance athletic safety through scientific research and the creation of performance standards for protective equipment. Formed in 1969, NOCSAE is a leading force in the effort to improve athletic equipment and, as a result, reduce injuries. NOCSAE efforts include the development of performance and test standards for football helmets and facemasks, baseball and softball batters and catchers helmets, baseballs and softballs, ice hockey helmets, soccer shin guards, lacrosse helmets and facemasks and polo helmets. NOCSAE is comprised of representatives from a number of groups which have an interest in athletic equipment – including manufacturers, reconditioners, athletic trainers, coaches, equipment managers, sports medicine and consumer organizations. These diverse interests have joined forces in an attempt to arrive at a common goal of reducing sports-related injuries. NOCSAE is a nonprofit, charitable organization supported by individuals and organizations with an interest in athletics. SOURCE: National Operhttps://ommittee on Standards for Athletic Equipment (NOCSAE) Questions/comments? contact Jean Rickerson at jean@SportsConcussions.org Back to top RELATED LINKShttps://www.nocsae.org Source: PR Newswire (https://s.tt/1ezQW)

PITTSBURGH – The unpredictable nature of concussions is one of the most frustrating factors to the millions of sufferers each year, but early neurological indicators and symptoms can predict a protracted healing time in certain cases, according to specialists at UPMC and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. “It’s a highly variable injury with a variety of outcomes,” said Michael “Micky” Collins, Ph.D., director of the UPMC Sports Medicine Concussion Program and co-investigator of the Pitt/UPMC study published in the February issue of Neurosurgery. “We see some patients who take a day or two to recover, and some who take a year or longer to recover. If clinicians had a way of determining within two days of injury who’s going to take a month or longer to recover, that’s a very important piece of information to have. It’s a game-changer.” The study, one of the first to examine concussion prognoses, showed that specific neurocognitive “cut-off” scores derived from ImPACT™ (Immediate Post-concussion Assessment and Cognitive Testing) improved clinicians’ ability to predict which sports-related concussions could take longer –- as much as five times longer -- to rehabilitate than others. They found, in as many as 85 percent of the cases, the scores could warn athletes, parents, coaches, schools, teams and health professionals when a concussion is likely to take on average a month to heal. Such an objective prognosis could help clinicians to better prepare a treatment plan, arrange academic accommodations for students and set tangible expectations for return to play and school, Dr. Collins said. The study reviewed 108 high-school football players who were given ImPACT tests within a median of two days after their concussions. Fifty boys experienced a recovery lasting, on average, 33 days before returning to play, and those longer rehabilitations could be forecast by specific “cut-off” scores in ImPACT Visual and Processing Speed testing. Migraine and cognitive symptoms also appeared to have predictive power. Study participants who scored above the threshold levels recovered within a median of seven days. “We’ve established statistical ‘cut-offs’ that indicate people who take a month or longer to recover,” Dr. Collins said. “Eighty percent of concussed people recover inside of three weeks. This prognostic information allows us to develop a risk profile of athletes who don’t recover well from this injury. Other study authors include Brian Lau, B.S., from the Pitt School of Medicine, and Mark Lovell, Ph.D., the Concussion Program’s founding director who retired from UPMC last summer. About UPMC Sports Medicine Cohttps://n Program The first-of-its-kind UPMC Sports Medicine Concussion Program, established in 2000, is the largest multi-disciplinary clinical and research program that focuses on the diagnosis, evaluation and management of sports-related concussion in athletes of all levels. The UPMC clinicians and researchers treat more than 13,000 patients a year, and published more than 75 clinical research studies in peer-reviewed scientific journals. About ImPACT ImPACT™ (Immediate Post-Concussion Assessment and Cognitive Testing) is an independently validated and researched concussion-evaluation system that has become the most widely used in the United States. Co-founded in the early 1990s by Drs. Mark Lovell, Joseph Maroon and Michael “Micky” Collins, who have a proprietary interest in ImPACT Applications, Inc., ImPACT is a 20-minute test that is a standard tool used as part of comprehensive clinical concussion management adopted across the NFL, NHL, NBA, Major League Baseball, college and high-school athletics -- with roughly 3 million people tested. Source: UPMC press release- https://www.upmc.com/mediarelations Photo courtesy UPMC

Coy Wire was a team captain for the Buffalo Bills (2002-2007) and the Atlanta Falcons (2008-2011) during his nine years in the NFL. An All-American Honors athlete at Stanford University, Coy was the first player to lead the Cardinal in both rushing and tackles. He was a recipient of the NFL’s Ed Block Courage Award. Q: What would you tell athletes about concussions? The NFL is in a state of evolution and recent changes will only make it safer for younger athletes. The league and the NFLPA (National Football League Players’ Association) have made huge strides to address the concussion issue, while maintaining the excitement of the game for both fans and players. It’s important that all athletes remember that you only get one brain and as we learn more about the long-term and adverse effects of contact sports and repetitive head injury, we know that smaller hits over the course of a career- even a high school career- can accumulate. Learn to recognize the symptoms of head trauma. You can have headaches or you might be slightly dizzy …these are all bearable and many athletes mask these symptoms by taking a Tylenol and then they go out and play again. But a concussion is not an ankle or shoulder injury…later in life you can have surgery on that ankle or have knee replacement surgery but you only get one brain. You can’t get a brain replacement. If you mask head trauma you can be risking increased problems in the future for Alzheimer’s or dementia. Head trauma has to be looked at very differently. Yes, in a way it’s a body part like a shoulder, but your brain must be treated very differently. You can ice and elevate an ankle but can’t do that with your brain. Real damage may show up later in life …and it’s not just football, it can happen in any sport. We used to look at toughness and playing through injuries as a badge of honor. That you were tough both mentally and physically and that continuing to play while hurt brought you the respect of your peers. But we need to change the culture now, and that starts with you. You need to believe that it’s OK to miss a game or a week or longer. If you do have to sit out, it means you were playing hard and you took one for the team. You shouldn’t feel ashamed. And if you care about your friends and your teammates, keep them from harm.https:// If you see a friend of yours doing something to hurt themselves, like playing with a concussion, step up and help them. You’re doing them a huge injustice by allowing them to continue to play. You are your brother’s keeper. Become a hero in their life and help them realize what they probably know deep down inside anyway. Someday they’ll look back and know what you did for them, and they’ll respect you more, later in their lives. Be a leader and help change the game. Help create a new norm. Coy Wire is the author of Change Your Mind; 10 Unconventional Secrets to Retrain Your Brain; March 2012. He is an inspirational speaker and mind coach. For more information contact him at https://www.coywire.com/